Every Datapoint Counts: Atmosphere-aided Flare Studies in the Rubin era

每个数据点都很重要：鲁宾时代的大气辅助耀斑研究

• 批准号: 2308016
• 负责人: Federica Bianco
• 金额: $ 24.87万
• 依托单位: University of Delaware
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2023
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2023-09-01 至 2025-08-31
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2308016&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Every; Datapoint; Counts; Atmosphere; aided

In 1859, the Earth was struck by a solar storm that disrupted telegraph stations and created visible aurorae as far south as Cuba. If the same storm were to happen today, it would cause trillions of dollars in damage to the world’s power grids and communication technology. Just before the event, English astronomer Richard Carrington observed a sudden brightening of the Sun’s surface - the first observation of a solar flare. Flares such as the one Carrington observed are not unique to the Sun, but also occur on other stars, especially those cooler and less massive than the Sun. They vary across a range of energies, temperatures, durations, and brightness. By measuring the properties of flares, we come closer to understanding how they work and how they affect a planet’s ability to sustain life. In particular, measuring the temperature of flares can tell us the extent to which they threaten the atmospheres of planets orbiting other stars. The Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST) will observe millions of stellar flares over its 10-year mission. The investigators are developing a technique to use the Earth’s atmosphere to measure the color, and thus the temperature, of the flares. This project will also sponsor a student at Lincoln University to work on “sonification” of Rubin data. This technique is the representation of data through sound, to make the results accessible to Blind and Visually Impaired (BVI) persons. The upcoming Vera C. Rubin Observatory through its Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST) provides an opportunity to collect a large ensemble of flare measurements from millions of stars across the sky. Because of the short flare duration and the survey cadence, it is unlikely that flares will be detected with more than one data point. This program aims to develop a methodology to enable LSST studies of stellar flares, with a focus on flare temperature and temperature evolution, which remain poorly constrained compared to the photometric morphology of flares. Leveraging the exquisite image quality and sensitivity expected from the Rubin system, Differential Chromatic Refraction can be used to constrain flare temperature from a single-epoch detection. Modeling the refraction effect as a function of the atmospheric column density, photometric filter, and temperature of the flare, flare temperatures at or above 10,000K can be constrained by a single g-band observation at airmass as low as X=1.2, given the minimum specified requirement on single-visit absolute astrometric accuracy of LSST. Nearly 100,000 g-band images are expected to be collected at higher airmass than X=1.2 in the Rubin LSST 10-year survey. This project will develop a pipeline to process LSST data and characterize a large sample of sparsely observed flare temperatures, which will constrain models of the physical processes behind flare emission as well as the relationship between flare parameters (e.g. temperature, duration, energy) and stellar parameters (e.g. spectral type, rotation, magnetic field).This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

1859年，一场太阳风暴袭击了地球，该风暴破坏了电报站，并创建了可见的极光，直至古巴。如果今天发生同一风暴，那将造成数万亿美元的损害世界的电网和通信技术。在活动发生之前，英国天文学家理查德·卡林顿（Richard Carrington）观察到太阳表面突然变亮 - 太阳耀斑的首次观察。诸如Carrington观察到的耀斑并不是太阳的独特之处，而是出现在其他恒星上，尤其是那些比太阳更凉爽且巨大的恒星。它们在各种能量，温度，持续时间和亮度上有所不同。通过测量耀斑的特性，我们更接近了解它们的工作方式以及它们如何影响行星维持生命的能力。特别是，测量耀斑的温度可以告诉我们它们在多大程度上威胁到绕其他恒星的行星大气的程度。对时空（LSST）的传统调查将在其10年的任务中观察数百万个恒星耀斑。研究人员正在开发一种技术，利用地球大气来测量耀斑的颜色，从而测量温度。该项目还将赞助林肯大学的一名学生，致力于鲁宾数据的“索赔”。该技术是通过声音来表示数据，以使盲人和视力障碍（BVI）的人可以访问结果。即将到来的Vera C. Rubin天文台通过其遗产时空调查（LSST）提供了一个机会，可以从天空中数百万颗恒星中收集大量的耀斑测量。由于耀斑的持续时间短和调查节奏，因此不太可能使用多个数据点检测到耀斑。该计划旨在开发一种方法来实现对恒星耀斑的LSST研究，重点是耀斑温度和温度演化，与耀斑的光度形态相比，该方法仍然受到限制。利用鲁宾系统预期的独家图像质量和灵敏度，可以使用差异色折射来限制耀斑温度的单位检测。将折射效应与大气色谱柱密度，光度滤光片和耀斑的温度，在10,000K处或高于10,000k的耀斑温度的函数建模，可以通过空气中的单个G波段观测到低至x = 1.2的单个G波段观测，鉴于单个visit的绝对精确度的最低指定要求。在鲁宾LSST 10年的调查中，预计在空气质量上收集近100,000张G波段图像。该项目将开发一条管道来处理LSST数据并表征大量稀疏观察到的耀斑温度样本，这将限制耀斑排放背后的物理过程的模型以及耀斑参数之间的关系（例如温度，持续时间，能量，能量）（例如温度，持续时间，能量）（例如，通过降级，旋转，磁场）来反映nsf satte n s n s nsf，基金会的智力优点和更广泛的影响评论标准。