It’s been too long since I’ve written on the Vera Rubin Observatory, and there’s progress to be seen- dynamic progress. The glass is on the telescope, and a camera too, but it’s the ComCam (Commissioning Camera), an under-populated version of… Read More »Vera Rubin Obs. Update Dec. 11 2024
It’s here (04 Dec 2024): the SSR writeup of Europa Clipper’s main camera(s). Turtle, E. P. McEwen, A. S. Patterson, G. W. et al. The Europa Imaging System (EIS)Investigation Vol 220, article no. 91, s11214-024-01115-9 I’ve written about Europa Clipper… Read More »Europa-Cam, Reviewed
I wrote previously (twice) on the Japanese COIAS Program (Come On! Impacting ASteroids) and its connection to the manga/TV show Asteroid in Love (Koisuru Asteroido in Japanese, abbreviated Koi As). Now I write again, courtesy of the IAU’s Working Group, Small… Read More »…COIAS Continued…
I mention that meteoritics, the study of meteorites in hand, often drills much deeper than astronomy (observing dots in the sky), or actual space flights (limited by mass, volume, power, data, etc.). In this paper (in the Dec. issue of… Read More »Note, Paper: Ge-ex-chimica
I missed this year’s Hayabusa Symposium, sorry. I was too tired from European Time to switch to Japan Time. And besides, the European Asteroid Size conference was looking forward, Hayabusa meetings are now (mostly…) looking back. In any case, this… Read More »2024 Hayabusa Symposium
Not immediately applicable, but …soon: in the Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific, November (vol. 136)- Lucas, M. Norris, B. Guyon, O. et al. Visible-light High-contrast Imaging and Polarimetrywith SCExAO/VAMPIRES art. 114504 ad89af The tech of adaptive optics… Read More »Note, Paper: Extreme Subaru
From the EU-ESA Workshop on Size Determination of Potentially Hazardous Near-Earth Objects: Wednesday, 11/13/24 ( … see also Monday and Tuesday) Polarimetric observations Double Trouble: Polarimetric Insights into the Didymos- Dimorphos post-DART Evolution Zuri GrayOn September 26, 2022, the NASA DART… Read More »Workshop: Size Determination of Potentially Hazardous NEOs pt. III
The EU-ESA Workshop on Size Determination of Potentially Hazardous Near-Earth Objects continues. For Tuesday, 11/12/24, we continued phase curves, but after that it was thermal infrared observations and polarimetry: https://indico.esa.int/event/530/contributions/ Absolute magnitudes and photometry from the MPC catalog Peter Vereš (Minor… Read More »Workshop: Size Determination of Potentially Hazardous NEOs pt. II
Ongoing: the EU-ESA Workshop on Size Determination of Potentially Hazardous Near-Earth Objects (https://indico.esa.int/event/530). Step one in “Planetary Defense” is, of course, to spot the Potentially Hazardous Objects (PHOs). But step two is also important: gauge the size of the threat object.… Read More »Workshop: Size Determination of Potentially Hazardous NEOs
Talk about New Astronomy. In vol. 113 (Dec), we see some details on Aster, the first deep-space probe to come from INPE (the Brazilian space agency)! de Carvalho Assis Goulant, G. Statella, T. Sfair, R. Definition of multispectral camera system… Read More »Note, Paper: Bem-Vindo Brasileiros