Astrophysics and Astronomy Commons^™

Cuny York College–Hosted Nasa Stem Outreach Program Graduates Over 30,000 Students – The Legacy Continues Amidst The Covid-19 Pandemic, Nazrul I. Khandaker

Publications and Research

The NASA MUREP (Minority University Research and Education Project) and SEMAA (Science, Engineering, Mathematics and Aerospace Academy) at York College CUNY (City University of New York), borough of Queens, New York City, recently earned a distinction by graduating over 30,000 underrepresented minority students since 1999 with the culmination of the fall 2021 session! African American students are leading the graduates, followed by Hispanic and Asian students being almost equal in proportion. The primary objective of both MAA (MUREP Aerospace Academy) and SEMAA is getting underrepresented minority students exposure to innovative STEM content and prepare many of them to enter higher …

Stability And Mechanical Properties Of W1-X Mox B4.2 (X=0.0-1.0) From First Principles, Weiguang Gong, Rui Xu, Xuecheng Shao, Quan Li, Changfeng Chen

Physics & Astronomy Faculty Research

Heavy transition-metal tetraborides (e.g., tungsten tetraboride, molybdenum tetraboride, and molybdenum-doped tungsten tetraboride) exhibit superior mechanical properties, but solving their complex crystal structures has been a long-standing challenge. Recent experimental x-ray and neutron diffraction measurements combined with first-principles structural searches have identified a complex structure model for tungsten tetraboride that contains a boron trimer as an unusual structural unit with a stoichiometry of 1:4.2. In this paper, we expand the study to binary MoB4.2 and ternary W1-xMoxB4.2 (x=0.0-1.0) compounds to assess their thermodynamic stability and mechanical properties using a tailor-designed crystal structure search method in conjunction with first-principles energetic calculations. Our …

Expres. Iii. Revealing The Stellar Activity Radial Velocity Signature Of Ε Eridani With Photometry And Interferometry, Rachael M. Roettenbacher, Samuel H. C. Cabot, Debra A. Fischer, John D. Monnier, Gregory W. Henry, Robert O. Harmon, Heidi Korhonen, John M. Brewer, Joe Llama, Ryan R. Petersburg, Lily L. Zhao, Stefan Kraus, Jean-Baptiste Le Bouquin, Narsireddy Anugu, Claire L. Davies, Tyler Gardner, Cyprien Lanthermann, Gail Schaefer, Benjamin Setterholm, Catherine A. Clark, Svetlana G. Jorstad, Kyler Kuehn, Stephen Levine

Information Systems and Engineering Management Research Publications

The distortions of absorption line profiles caused by photospheric brightness variations on the surfaces of cool, main-sequence stars can mimic or overwhelm radial velocity (RV) shifts due to the presence of exoplanets. The latest generation of precision RV spectrographs aims to detect velocity amplitudes ≲ 10 cm s⁻¹, but requires mitigation of stellar signals. Statistical techniques are being developed to differentiate between Keplerian and activity-related velocity perturbations. Two important challenges, however, are the interpretability of the stellar activity component as RV models become more sophisticated, and ensuring the lowest-amplitude Keplerian signatures are not inadvertently accounted for in flexible …

Eccentric Neutron Star Disk Driven Type Ii Outburst Pairs In Be/X-Ray Binaries, Alessia Franchini, Rebecca G. Martin

Physics & Astronomy Faculty Research

Be star X-ray binaries are transient systems that show two different types of outbursts. Type I outbursts occur each orbital period while type II outbursts have a period and duration that are not related to any periodicity of the binary system. Type II outbursts may be caused by mass transfer to the neutron star from a highly eccentric Be star disk. A sufficiently misaligned Be star decretion disk undergoes secular Von Zeipel-Lidov-Kozai (ZLK) oscillations of eccentricity and inclination. Observations show that in some systems the type II outbursts come in pairs with the second being of lower luminosity. We use …

The Temple Of Immensity: For Choir And Electronics, Steven Naylor

Honors Projects

the temple of immensity is a composition for 16-part choir and fixed media electronics composed by Steven Naylor using astronomical data concerning the stars nearest to Earth and their properties. “The temple of immensity” is an archaic and rarely used term, defined as “the universe or the complete overhead expanse of the heavens, especially as conceived as an object of religious reverence.” This piece seeks to convey feelings of wonder and awe for outer space through the setting of an original self-composed poem and through the use of star data to determine musical aspects. The resulting 28-minute composition blends voices …

The Kelvin-Helmholtz Instability From The Perspective Of Hybrid Simulations, Peter A. Delamere, Nathan P. Barnes, Xuanye Ma, Jay R. Johnson

Faculty Publications

The flow shear-driven Kelvin-Helmholtz (KH) instability is ubiquitous in planetary magnetospheres. At Earth these surface waves are important along the dawn and dusk flanks of the magnetopause boundary while at Jupiter and Saturn the entire dayside magnetopause boundary can exhibit KH activity due to corotational flows in the magnetosphere. Kelvin-Helmholtz waves can be a major ingredient in the so-called viscous-like interaction with the solar wind. In this paper, we review the KH instability from the perspective of hybrid (kinetic ions, fluid electrons) simulations. Many of the simulations are based on parameters typically found at Saturn’s magnetopause boundary, but the results …

The Emission Spectrum Of The Hot Jupiter Wasp-79b From Hst/Wfc3, Trevor O. Foote, Nikole K. Lewis, Brian M. Kilpatrick, Jayesh M. Goyal, Giovanni Bruno, Hannah R. Wakeford, Nina Robbins-Blanch, Tiffany Kataria, Ryan J. Macdonald, Mercedes López-Morales, David K. Sing, Thomas Mikal-Evans, Vincent Bourrier, Gregory Henry, Lars A. Buchhave

Information Systems and Engineering Management Research Publications

Here we present a thermal emission spectrum of WASP-79b, obtained via Hubble Space Telescope Wide Field Camera 3 G141 observations as part of the PanCET program. As we did not observe the ingress or egress of WASP-79b's secondary eclipse, we consider two scenarios: a fixed mid-eclipse time based on the expected occurrence time, and a mid-eclipse time as a free parameter. In both scenarios, we can measure thermal emission from WASP-79b from 1.1 to 1.7 μm at 2.4σ confidence consistent with a 1900 K brightness temperature for the planet. We combine our observations with Spitzer dayside photometry (3.6 and 4.5 …

Newgrange Skyscape In Stellarium, Frank Prendergast

Articles

Newgrange Skyscape in Stellarium is a new customised landscape planetarium model giving the user the unique ability to interrogate the dynamic sky above the Boyne Valley on any date of interest during the hours of daylight or darkness. Archaeological, astronomical and topographical points of interest are labelled in the model and visible even during the hours of darkness. These are summarily described in a short gazetteer appended at the end of the instruction document to encourage further exploration of the wonderful heritage found in the Boyne Valley and beyond.

Watch on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=aGPsVGBXkY4

Watch on Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/493351576

Point Absorber Limits To Future Gravitational-Wave Detectors, Wenxuan Jia, Hiroaki Yamamoto, Kevin Kuns, Anamaria Effler, Matthew Evans, Peter Fritschel, R. Abbott, C. Adams, R. Adhikari, Karla E. Ramirez

Physics & Astronomy Faculty Publications

High-quality optical resonant cavities require low optical loss, typically on the scale of parts per million. However, unintended micron-scale contaminants on the resonator mirrors that absorb the light circulating in the cavity can deform the surface thermoelastically, and thus increase losses by scattering light out of the resonant mode. The point absorber effect is a limiting factor in some highpower cavity experiments, for example, the Advanced LIGO gravitational wave detector. In this Letter, we present a general approach to the point absorber effect from first principles and simulate its contribution to the increased scattering. The achievable circulating power in current …

Search For Lensing Signatures In The Gravitational-Wave Observations From The First Half Of Ligo–Virgo's Third Observing Run, Richard Abbott, Thomas D. Abbott, S. Abraham, Fausto Acernese, Mario C. Diaz, Soma Mukherjee, Volker Quetschke, Karla E. Ramirez, Wenhui Wang

Physics & Astronomy Faculty Publications

We search for signatures of gravitational lensing in the gravitational-wave signals from compact binary coalescences detected by Advanced Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO) and Advanced Virgo during O3a, the first half of their third observing run. We study: (1) the expected rate of lensing at current detector sensitivity and the implications of a non-observation of strong lensing or a stochastic gravitational-wave background on the merger-rate density at high redshift; (2) how the interpretation of individual high-mass events would change if they were found to be lensed; (3) the possibility of multiple images due to strong lensing by galaxies or galaxy …

Search For Lensing Signatures In The Gravitational-Wave Observations From The First Half Of Ligo–Virgo's Third Observing Run, Ligo Scientific Collaboration, Virgo Collaboration, Tiffany Z. Summerscales

Faculty Publications

We search for signatures of gravitational lensing in the gravitational-wave signals from compact binary coalescences detected by Advanced Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO) and Advanced Virgo during O3a, the first half of their third observing run. We study: (1) the expected rate of lensing at current detector sensitivity and the implications of a non-observation of strong lensing or a stochastic gravitational-wave background on the merger-rate density at high redshift; (2) how the interpretation of individual high-mass events would change if they were found to be lensed; (3) the possibility of multiple images due to strong lensing by galaxies or galaxy …

Developing A Practice In Remote Sensing For Next-Generation Human Rights Researchers, Theresa Harris, Jonathan Drake, Umesh K. Haritashya, Wumi Asubiaro Dada, Fredy Cumes

Biennial Conference: The Social Practice of Human Rights

Remote sensing is increasingly recognized as an important tool for documenting human rights abuses. When used alongside interviews, case studies, surveys, forensic science, and other well-established research methods in human rights and humanitarian practice, remotely sensed data can effectively geolocate and establish chronologies for mass graves, forced displacement, destruction of cultural heritage sites, and other violations. But as a highly technical field of science that relies on ever-changing technologies, remote sensing and geospatial analysis are not readily accessible for human rights and humanitarian practitioners. The community of practice grew out of innovative work by practitioners at NGOs and specialized inter-governmental …

Learning Orbital Dynamics Of Binary Black Hole Systems From Gravitational Wave Measurements, Brendan Keith, Akshay Khadse, Scott E. Field

Faculty and Student Publications

We introduce a gravitational waveform inversion strategy that discovers mechanical models of binary black hole (BBH) systems. We show that only a single time series of (possibly noisy) waveform data is necessary to construct the equations of motion for a BBH system. Starting with a class of universal differential equations parameterized by feed-forward neural networks, our strategy involves the construction of a space of plausible mechanical models and a physics-informed constrained optimization within that space to minimize the waveform error. We apply our method to various BBH systems including extreme and comparable mass ratio systems in eccentric and noneccentric orbits. …

Study Of E+E- → D (1 S,2 S)Η And E+E- → D (1s)Η′ At S =10.866 Gev With The Belle Detector, E. Kovalenko, A. Garmash, P. Krokovny, I. Adachi, H. Aihara, D. M. Asner, V. Aulchenko, T. Aushev, R. Ayad, V. Babu, S. Bahinipati, P. Behera, J. Bennett, M. Bessner, T. Bilka, J. Biswal, A. Bobrov, A. Bondar, G. Bonvicini

Faculty and Student Publications

We report the first observation of the processes e+e-→D(1S,2S)η at s=10.866 GeV, with significance exceeding 10σ for both processes. The measured Born cross sections are σ(e+e-→D(2S)η)=2.07±0.21±0.19 pb, and σ(e+e-→D(1S)η)=0.42±0.08±0.04 pb. We also set the upper limit on the cross section of the process e+e-→D(1S)η′ to be σ(e+e-→D(1S)η′)<0.037 pb at 90% C.L. The results are obtained with the data sample collected with the Belle detector at the KEKB asymmetric-energy e+e- collider in the energy range from 10.63 to 11.02 GeV.

Measurements Of Q2 Moments Of Inclusive B →Xcℓ+Νℓ Decays With Hadronic Tagging, R. Van Tonder, L. Cao, W. Sutcliffe, M. Welsch, F. U. Bernlochner, I. Adachi, H. Aihara, D. M. Asner, T. Aushev, R. Ayad, V. Babu, P. Behera, K. Belous, J. Bennett, M. Bessner, V. Bhardwaj, B. Bhuyan, T. Bilka, J. Biswal

Faculty and Student Publications

We present the measurement of the first to fourth order moments of the four-momentum transfer squared, q2, of inclusive B→Xcℓ+νℓ decays using the full Belle dataset of 711 fb-1 of integrated luminosity at the (4S) resonance where ℓ=e, μ. The determination of these moments and their systematic uncertainties open new pathways to determine the absolute value of the Cabibbo-Kobayashi-Maskawa matrix element Vcb using a reduced set of matrix elements of the heavy quark expansion. In order to identify and reconstruct the Xc system, we reconstruct one of the two B-mesons using machine learning techniques in fully hadronic decay modes. The …

The Belle Ii Online–Offline Data Operations System, Matthew Barrett, Takanori Hara, Michel Hernández Villanueva, Kunxian Huang, Dhiraj Kalita, Petteri Kettunen, Prashant Shingade

Faculty and Student Publications

Data collection at the Belle II experiment started in the spring of 2019. During the early stages of the experiment it is important that the raw data are both copied to permanent storage and made available soon after being recorded to allow for the timely commissioning and calibration of the detector. Automated procedures have been developed to transfer the data from the detector in a timely manner; these procedures include fault management, performance monitoring, and quality checks. It is important that the systems put in place will also scale to the much higher data rates expected in the coming years …

Software Training In Hep, Sudhir Malik, Samuel Meehan, Kilian Lieret, Meirin Oan Evans, Michel H. Villanueva, Daniel S. Katz, Graeme A. Stewart, Peter Elmer, Sizar Aziz, Matthew Bellis, Riccardo Maria Bianchi, Gianluca Bianco, Johan Sebastian Bonilla, Angela Burger, Jackson Burzynski, David Chamont, Matthew Feickert, Philipp Gadow, Bernhard Manfred Gruber

Faculty and Student Publications

The long-term sustainability of the high-energy physics (HEP) research software ecosystem is essential to the field. With new facilities and upgrades coming online throughout the 2020s, this will only become increasingly important. Meeting the sustainability challenge requires a workforce with a combination of HEP domain knowledge and advanced software skills. The required software skills fall into three broad groups. The first is fundamental and generic software engineering (e.g., Unix, version control, C++, and continuous integration). The second is knowledge of domain-specific HEP packages and practices (e.g., the ROOT data format and analysis framework). The third is more advanced knowledge involving …

Toi-2109: An Ultrahot Gas Giant On A 16 Hr Orbit, I. Wong, A. Shporer, G. Zhou, D. Kitzmann, T. D. Komacek, X. Tan, R. Tronsgaard, L. A. Buchhave, S. Vissapragada, M. Greklek-Mckeon, J. E. Rodriguez, J. P. Ahlers, S. N. Quinn, E. Furlan, S. B. Howell, A. Bieryla, K. Heng, H. A. Knutson, K. A. Collins, K. K. Mcleod, P. Berlind, P. Brown, M. L. Calkins, J. P. De Leon, E. Esparza-Borges, G. A. Esquerdo, A. Fukui, T. Gan, E. Girardin, C. L. Gnilka, M. Ikoma, Eric L.N. Jensen, J. Kielkopf, T. Kodama, S. Kurita, K. V. Lester, P. Lewin, G. Marino, F. Murgas, N. Narita, E. Pallé, R. P. Schwarz, K. G. Stassun, M. Tamura, N. Watanabe, B. Benneke, G. R. Ricker, D. W. Latham, R. Vanderspek, S. Seager, J. N. Winn, J. M. Jenkins, D. A. Caldwell, W. Fong, C. X. Huang, I. Mireles, J. E. Schlieder, B. Shiao, J. N. Villaseñor

Physics & Astronomy Faculty Works

We report the discovery of an ultrahot Jupiter with an extremely short orbital period of 0.67247414 ± 0.00000028 days (∼16 hr). The 1.347 ± 0.047 R_Jup planet, initially identified by the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) mission, orbits TOI-2109 (TIC 392476080)—a T_eff ∼ 6500 K F-type star with a mass of 1.447 ± 0.077 M_☉, a radius of 1.698 ± 0.060 R_☉, and a rotational velocity of v sin i_* = 81.9 ± 1.7 km s⁻¹. The planetary nature of TOI-2109b was confirmed through radial-velocity measurements, which yielded a planet mass of 5.02 …

Tic 172900988: A Transiting Circumbinary Planet Detected In One Sector Of Tess Data, V. B. Kostov, B. P. Powell, J. A. Orosz, W. F. Welsh, W. Cochran, K. A. Collins, M. Endl, C. Hellier, D. W. Latham, P. Macqueen, J. Pepper, B. Quarles, L. Sairam, G. Torres, R. F. Wilson, S. Bergeron, P. Boyce, A. Bieryla, R. Buchheim, C. B. Christiansen, D. R. Ciardi, K. I. Collins, D. M. Conti, S. Dixon, P. Guerra, N. Haghighipour, J. Herman, E. G. Hintz, W. S. Howard, Eric L.N. Jensen, J. F. Kielkopf, E. Kruse, N. M. Law, D. Martin, P. F. L. Maxted, B. T. Montet, F. Murgas, M. Nelson, G. Olmschenk, S. Otero, R. Quimby, M. Richmond, R. P. Schwarz, A. Shporer, K. G. Stassun, D. C. Stephens, A. H. M. J. Triaud, J. Ulowetz, B. S. Walter, E. Wiley, D. Wood, M. Yenawine, E. Agol, T. Barclay, T. G. Beatty, I. Boisse, D. A. Caldwell, J. Christiansen, K. D. Colón, M. Deleuil, L. Doyle, M. Fausnaugh, G. Fűrész, E. A. Gilbert, G. Hébrard, D. J. James, J. Jenkins, S. R. Kane, R. C. Kidwell Jr., R. Kopparapu, G. Li, J. J. Lissauer, M. B. Lund, S. R. Majewski, T. Mazeh, S. N. Quinn, E. Quintana, G. Ricker, J. E. Rodriguez, J. Rowe, A. Santerne, J. Schlieder, S. Seager, M. R. Standing, D. J. Stevens, E. B. Ting, R. Vanderspek, J. N. Winn

Physics & Astronomy Faculty Works

We report the first discovery of a transiting circumbinary planet detected from a single sector of Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) data. During Sector 21, the planet TIC 172900988b transited the primary star and then five days later it transited the secondary star. The binary is itself eclipsing, with a period P ≈ 19.7 days and an eccentricity e ≈ 0.45. Archival data from ASAS-SN, Evryscope, KELT, and SuperWASP reveal a prominent apsidal motion of the binary orbit, caused by the dynamical interactions between the binary and the planet. A comprehensive photodynamical analysis of the TESS, archival and follow-up data …

The Hashtag Project: The First Submillimeter Images Of The Andromeda Galaxy From The Ground, Matthew W.L. Smith, Stephen A. Eales, Thomas G. Williams, Bumhyun Lee, Zongnan Li, Pauline Barmby, Martin Bureau, Scott Chapman, Brian S. Cho, Aeree Chung, Eun Jung Chung, Hui Hsuan Chung, Christopher J.R. Clark, David L. Clements, Timothy A. Davis, Ilse De Looze, David J. Eden, Gayathri Athikkat-Eknath, George P. Ford, Yu Gao, Walter Gear, Haley L. Gomez, Richard De Grijs, Jinhua He, Luis C. Ho, Thomas M. Hughes, Sihan Jiao, Zhiyuan Li, Francisca Kemper

Physics and Astronomy Publications

Observing nearby galaxies with submillimeter telescopes on the ground has two major challenges. First, the brightness is significantly reduced at long submillimeter wavelengths compared to the brightness at the peak of the dust emission. Second, it is necessary to use a high-pass spatial filter to remove atmospheric noise on large angular scales, which has the unwelcome side effect of also removing the galaxy's large-scale structure. We have developed a technique for producing high-resolution submillimeter images of galaxies of large angular size by using the telescope on the ground to determine the small-scale structure (the large Fourier components) and a space …