Covers all aspects of general help and support for the LCOGT community
Everyone needs help even if its only occasionally. This group will have pointers to help documents, tutorials and suggestions of things to try if you are really stuck. If you can’t find what you are looking for, you can post a question which anyone in our online community to answer.
On this page you will find all the supplementary information you will need for making an application to LCOGTLas Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope Network for use of the telescope network. We have a provided a LaTex template and style file for use in applying for time as well as an exposure time calculator. read more »
For the past week Richard Miles (BAA) has been following an as-yet unidentified object orbiting the Sun (dubbed 2010 KQ), using Faulkes Telescope North. Recent observations suggest it is a man-made object with an exciting past.
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For those of you who have been following our news of recent comet observations and analysis by Richard Miles (BAA), he has provided us with an update on his observations of comet Vales.
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The discovery of nine new planets challenges the reigning theory of the formation of planets, according to new observations by astronomers, 2 of which for our own Dr Rachel Street and Dr Tim Lister .
Unlike the planets in our solar system, two of the newly discovered planets are orbiting in the opposite direction to the rotation of their host star. This upsets the primary theory of how planets are formed. The planets are called “exoplanets” because they are located outside of our solar system.
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The CoRoT satellite, operated by the French space agency CNES, has discovered a Jupiter- sized planet orbiting a star similar to the Sun in the constellation Serpens Cauda at a distance of 1500 light-yearsThe distance that light travels in a vacuum in one year. Approximately 9.5 × 10^12 km or 63,240 AU. from the Earth. The parameters of this gas giant, which has features in common with the majority of exoplanets discovered so far, represents a valuable standard model when it comes to identifying new Jovian-type bodies with moderate temperatures.
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This comet appears to have undergone another massive outburst, this time on 2010 February 2 increasing in brightness by a factor of 30-40. The object is one of the largest active comets known. It follows a near-circular path about 6.2 AU from the Sun, i.e. well beyond the orbit of Jupiter. This is its fourth outburst of a similar magnitude in the past 8 years. The nucleus of the comet is probably about 50 km in size and its behaviour may be a consequence of its very slow rotation along with the fact that it appears to be rich in carbon monoxide, a very volatile gas. The outburst was discovered only a few hours after it had begun by amateur astronomer, Faustino Garcia of Asturias, Spain on February 2nd at 23:58 UT during the course of routine monitoring of several comets. read more »
The main goal of this activity is to obtain a supernova light curve using downloaded data taken with the Faulkes Telescopes. The software package, SalsaJ will be used to carry out photometry on the supernova and standard star (a star which has already had its magnitude accurately calculated).
Submitted by sroberts on 11 December, 2009 - 11:27.
8 Dec 2009 11:00 - 14:30 UTC
On 8th Dec, we held the first of our themed observing days to image the Hickson Compact Groups of galaxies. These compact groups of galaxies are so-called after the Canadian astronomer, Paul Hickson, who began identifying and compiling a catalogue of these objects in the 1980s. His list of 100 groups is published in the ‘Atlas of Compact Groups of Galaxies’, together with black and white images of each group.
The aim of our ‘Hickson Compact Groups’ themed observing days is to produce deep colour images of these groups. read more »
In this activity, Google Earth will be used to observe and measure some real impact craters on the surface of the Earth. These craters vary in size from small ( a few hundred metres) to very large (over 100km).
The aim of this activity is to investigate the factors which affect the size of an impact crater on Earth.
Students must plan the experiment, including what variables to change
and investigate, before carrying out the experiment in a controlled and
scientific manner.
This worksheet is based around the topic of asteroids, comets,
NEOs and impacts and aims to help you learn about these objects in the Solar System. The worksheet can be downloaded and printed out
for use in the classroom or at home.
Asteroids are rocky objects which orbit the Sun in our Solar System, but are too small to be considered planets. They are in fact, commonly known as Minor Planets due to their size. The majority of the asteroids in our Solar System orbit the Sun in what we call the ‘Asteroid Belt’. This is located between Mars and Jupiter as can be seen in the diagram below.
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I have been working with a student from Mechelen Technical School (near Antwerp), Belgium on an asteroid project. The student contacted me about using the "Making Craters " activity as part of year long project for final year of secondary school. He has just submitted his dissertation and has presented it to a judging panel. Here are his experiences read more »
Starting 1 Oct 2009, access to observing time on the Faulkes Telescopes will be through a process of written proposals, mediated by an LCOGTLas Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope Network Telescope Allocation Committee (TAC). The purpose of this note is to notify those who are eligible and expected to respond to this call, to describe the process and its intended goals, and to describe how to submit a proposal. read more »
We’ve recently launched an exoplanet observing programme, and are looking for people to help with observing these very rare microlensing events. One such group in Ireland has already taken up the challenge and successfully observed 10 different candidates (each one multiple times). Each time the group meets they write a detailed blog entry about their experiences. read more »
I have booked a session for the telescope for 2nd June so would like to use the simulator to plan the session. However I get an error message when I try to log on to the simulator saying
‘There is a problem with this website’s security certificate’ read more »
Last week (April 23-26, 2009) we have had a traditional (9th) Science and Art Festival in our town Torun (Poland). Since the beginning it is connected with Nicholas Copernicus University and other institutions in our region, which during 4 days prepare more than 150 (this year almost 170) events covering around 40 science and art disciplines. It is very popular not only among our town’s inhabitants, some people come to visit our town during these days to have also an opportunity to see something interesting (total number of visitors of all the events is estimated to around 30 000). read more »
The discovery of the icy exoplanet OGLE-2005-BLG-390Lb (just 5 times more massive than Earth) by the technique of gravitational microlensing provided the first observational hint that Earth-like planets are common in the Universe. The existence of this new world was revealed from a small blip in the brightness of the star, on just one night, but we will probably never be able to see it again by this method.
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During this activity you will be simulating the effect of a meteorite impact on the Earth. You can change the physical character of both the meteorite and type of ground that it hits and see what happens. The simulated results will be compared to existing Earth craters at various locations across the globe.
Asteroids are impossible to spot in single images so we need to use software to find them. To identify an asteroid, we have to catch it moving. This article will show you how to you a free piece of software called astrometrica to do this. read more »
Astrometrica is a simple to use Windows application which will read in raw telescope data (FITS files) for a set of observations, and check to see if there are any moving objects in them. You can ‘blink’ data files to see the object moving, mark its name if its know about, and even report a new asteroid to the Minor Planets Center. read more »
The transits of a planet in a Keplarian orbit around its host star
are exactly periodic. However, if a third body is present in the
system, the orbits are not Keplarian, and the time between consecutive
transits varies (Holman & Murray 2005, Agol et al. 2005). This offers the possibility of detecting non-transiting planets via photometry. read more »
The aim of this project is to determine a population of Luminous Blue Variable stars (LBVs) in external galaxies in the Local Group. This is important as this phase of Post Main Sequence (PMS) life is critical in determining the mass of the relativistic remnant left behind after the supernova event. To accomplish this, we will obtain photometric observations of spectroscopic candidates identified in e.g. Massey et al (2007).
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The physics of star formation remains an outstanding problem within astrophysics. This problem is particularly acute for the production of OB stars (with masses in excess of 20 times that of the Sun); where the apparent brevity of the process (<100,000 yrs) and the presence of significant extinction (>>30 visual magnitudes) due to their birth clouds, make observations of high mass protostars highly challenging.
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By using the surface features as an indication of magnetic field strength in Pre Main Sequence (PMS) stars, using the LCOGTLas Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope Network network, a long-term photometric monitoring campaign with semi-regular cadence will allow one to measure magnetic activity cycles. As the surface features get more prevalent and then disappear, the amplitude of the brightness modulation they create will increase and decrease. The period of this amplitude variation should be a good proxy for magnetic field activity.
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The aim of this project is determining the angular momentum history of Pre Main Sequence (PMS) stars in young clusters. Assuming a conservation of angular momentum, as these stars contract during formation, they should all be rotating rapidly after a very short amount of time (~2 Myrs). However, rotation periods of young cluster members show that most of these stars rotate much more slowly than expected. For many years, the precise mechanism which prevents these stars from spinning up has been debated, with no conclusive observational evidence to support one mechanism over another.
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Use astronomical data files taken with the Hubble Space telescope, Spitzer space telescope and Faulkes Telescope North you will create your own color images of the ancient cosmic explosion Cassiopeia A.
Asteroids are awkward; they don’t stay in one place! Not only that, as the Earth rotates, different asteroids are visible from the Earth at different times. You might therefore think that finding the position of an asteroid in the sky might be a difficult task. Fortunately, much of the difficult work has already been done by various groups of people, and it is not as difficult as you might imagine finding the co-ordinates of an asteroid in the sky. You will need to follow these instructions on the same day as your observing session. read more »
Groups are ways which everyone can interact. Join a group, post a latest activity to a group, a paper or a blog. Use groups to advertize events and promote what you are doing.
