Thirty-six science and engineering students visited LCOGT headquarters today. The students are participating in the residential Summer Science Program at Westmont College. Among other activities, the students are using the Westmont Keck Telescope to locate and track asteroids.
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At Las Cumbres Observatory, astronomer Melissa Graham provided the group an overview of LCOGT's global network, the astronomy performed on the network, and plans for the future. Students toured the Goleta facility where they viewed the 1-meter telescope master observatory where new components and instrumentation is tested, and the 1-meter assembly area. They also visited the 0.4-meter assembly area, the machine shop and staging area where control panels are commissioned, and the server room.
Students then held a question and answer session with some of the LCOGT staff. Jason Eastman, astronomer, spoke about his research in transiting exoplanets and design and construction of the Network Robotic Echelle Spectrograph (NRES). Ben Burleson, software developer, responsible for developing the low-level code that runs the component devices such as focus and drive motors and fans, talked about the integrated system that monitors and controls the robotic telescopes. Gary White, network administrator, covered the network and data management system required for a global astrophysics research institute.
Graham then provided a tutorial on how to use publicly-available data on the LCOGT website to download and create color astrophotographs, and concluded with methods of using color photometry to locate asteroids. Madison Dochterman, interning with LCOGT for the summer, participated in the event. Dochterman is perfecting and documenting the astrophotography methodology. See the online tutorial explaining how to create astrophotographs using available data.
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