Bulletin of the American Physical Society
2018 Annual Meeting of the APS Four Corners Section
Volume 63, Number 16
Friday–Saturday, October 12–13, 2018; University of Utah, Salt Lake City, Utah
Session J06: Astronomy and Astrophysics Frontiers |
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Chair: Joseph Foy, Arizona State University Room: CSC 210 |
Saturday, October 13, 2018 8:00AM - 8:24AM |
J06.00001: Striking Exoplanetary Gold: Systems with Multiple Transiting Planets from the Kepler Space Telescope Invited Speaker: Darin Ragozzine Our generation is the first to characterize planets around other stars ("exoplanets") well enough to determine their densities, a crucial step towards understanding exoplanet formation and habitability. Measuring densities requires determining the mass and size of an exoplanet. Exoplanetary radii are measured by observing the amount of light lost as a planet passes in front of ("transits") its parent star. Exoplanetary masses are determined by observing the gravitational effect of a planet on the star or on other planets. As planet-planet interactions are larger, it is sometimes easier to measure masses (and thus densities) by watching for gravitational interactions between the planets. One of the greatest discoveries of NASA's Kepler Space Telescope (“Kepler”) is the identification of stars with multiple transiting exoplanets because it enables density measurements of small exoplanets. Kepler has discovered about 700 systems with multiple transiting planets, a huge milestone for exoplanet discovery. After describing these systems, their value, and what we already know, I will discuss a new method that I will apply to provide the most precise and accurate densities for the largest number of Kepler exoplanets. |
Saturday, October 13, 2018 8:24AM - 8:36AM |
J06.00002: Demonstration of a digital intensity interferometry system with the StarBase observatory Nolan Matthews, Orville Clarke, Rylee Cardon, Stephan LeBohec, David B Kieda A modern implementation of intensity interferometry onto current and future optical telescope arrays allows for unprecedented angular resolution capabilities (< 1 mas) at short optical wavelengths (U/B/V bands). The technique is well suited for observing and characterizing hot main-sequence stars, primarily of O,B, or A spectral types. Observations at the pathfinder observatory, StarBase, located in Grantsville, UT, have demonstrated the feasibility of implementing the technique onto current and future Imaging Air Cherenkov telescopes, constructed for gamma-ray astronomy. In this talk, I present the optical and electronic system used in these observations that have led to a preliminary detection of the signal associated with the spatial coherence of the source. Furthermore, recent developments allow for a “wireless” mode, as demonstrated by the synchronization of separated data acquisition systems to nanosecond timescales. The system is portable, and plans are underway to test the system on a distributed array of large diameter (12 m) Imaging Air Cherenkov telescopes in Fall 2018. |
Saturday, October 13, 2018 8:36AM - 8:48AM |
J06.00003: Simulating the Short Baseline Array of the ngVLA Rachel C Parziale The Next Generation Very Large Array (ngVLA) is a centimeter-millimeter interferometer consisting of a main array with 214, 18 meter antennas. The largest scale structures the ngVLA can observe are determined by its shortest baselines, which are limited by the diameter of the antennas. The main array by itself achieves insufficient resolution for all science projects planned for the ngVLA. In order to observe the largest scale structures, the ngVLA will also contain a compact, centrally-located array of antennas in a short baseline configuration referred to as the Short Baseline Array (SBA). The SBA will contain 19, 6 meter antennas. Two different configurations for the SBA were investigated: one configuration with regularly spaced antennas and one configuration with randomly spaced antennas. The configurations were investigated by simulating observations of sky images and simulated disks to investigate the PSF deconvolution of the observations and the and flux recovery at different scales. The results show that, although it produces more prominent sidelobes, the regularly spaced SBA configuration recovers more flux density than the randomly spaced SBA configuration on scales larger than a diameter of ten arcseconds. |
Saturday, October 13, 2018 8:48AM - 9:00AM |
J06.00004: Development of a prototype Schwarzschild-Couder telescope for the Cherenkov Telescope Array: status and performance David B Kieda The 9.7m diameter Schwarzschild-Couder (SC) medium-sized telescope is a candidate for the Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA). It exploits a novel aplanatic two-mirror optical design to provide a large field of view of 8 degrees and improved angular resolution across the whole field of view compared to single-mirror designs. In addition, the reduced plate scale of the camera allows the use of highly integrated photon detectors, such as silicon photomultipliers, improving the sensitivity at low energies. The construction of a prototype Schwarzschild-Couder telescope (pSCT) started in June 2015 at the Fred Lawrence Whipple Observatory in Southern Arizona and is nearing completion. In this contribution, we report on the design, implementation, and initial commissioning tests of the pSCT telescope. |
Saturday, October 13, 2018 9:00AM - 9:12AM |
J06.00005: The ICARUS Cosmic Ray Tagger Data Acquisition System Tyler N Boone, Robert John Wilson The ICARUS (Imaging Cosmic And Rare Underground Signals) experiment is nearing its time to begin taking data as the far detector at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory Short-Baseline Neutrino program. A vital subsystem of the experiment is the Cosmic Ray Tagger (CRT), which will provide necessary background rejection of cosmogenic events in the detector. The data acquisition (DAQ) system for the CRT must interface with the DAQ for the liquid argon Time Projection Chamber (TPC) and Photomultiplier Tube systems, that constitute the main neutrino detector, while maintaining precision in the relative timing for the three systems. Herein we discuss the plans for the CRT in order to ensure communication between the CRT and detector is effective and reliable. |
Saturday, October 13, 2018 9:12AM - 9:24AM |
J06.00006: The EUSO-SPB2 mission George Filippatos The Extreme Universe Space Observatory Super Pressure Balloon mission Two(EUSO-SPB2) is in preparation. The planned launch date is 2021. This balloon mission will serve as a test of techniques and methods for the Probe of Extreme Multi Messenger Astronomy (POEMMA) space mission currently under a NASA sponsored conceptual design. A science payload of up to three optical cosmic ray telescopes are planned for this long duration mission. Two of them are designed to detect direct Cherenkov light near the direction of the Earth’s limb, while the third one uses the fluorescence technique to measure near horizontal showers. SPB2 will feature advanced optics and electronics, as well a more mature design than its predecessor SPB1. To understand the effect of these improvements, reconstructions are done on simulated air showers. We present the preliminary results of the simulations, and expected performance gains relative to SPB1. |
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