Program Number | Principal Investigator | Program Title |
---|---|---|
12893 | Ronald L Gilliland, The Pennsylvania State University | Study of Small and Cool Kepler Planet Candidates with High Resolution Imaging |
13291 | Masao Hayashi, National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (NAOJ) | Resolving internal structures of the progenitors of early-type galaxies in a vigorously forming cluster at z=2.5 |
13297 | Giampaolo Piotto, Universita degli Studi di Padova | The HST Legacy Survey of Galactic Globular Clusters: Shedding UV Light on Their Populations and Formation |
13301 | J. Michael Shull, University of Colorado at Boulder | Deep COS Spectra of the Two Brightest Quasars that Probe the He II Post-Reionization Era |
13312 | Danielle Berg, University of Minnesota - Twin Cities | The Evolution of C/O in Low Metallicity Dwarf Galaxies |
13315 | Marc W. Buie, Southwest Research Institute | Pluto Satellite Orbits in Support of New Horizons |
13330 | Bradley M Peterson, The Ohio State University | Mapping the AGN Broad Line Region by Reverberation |
13331 | Laurent Pueyo, Space Telescope Science Institute | Confirmation and characterization of young planetary companions hidden in the HST NICMOS archive |
13332 | Seth Redfield, Wesleyan University | A SNAP Survey of the Local Interstellar Medium: New NUV Observations of Stars with Archived FUV Observations |
13344 | Adam Riess, The Johns Hopkins University | A 1% Measurement of the Distance Scale with Perpendicular Spatial Scanning |
13352 | Matthew A. Malkan, University of California - Los Angeles | WFC3 Infrared Spectroscopic Parallel Survey WISP: A Survey of Star Formation Across Cosmic Time |
13364 | Daniela Calzetti, University of Massachusetts - Amherst | LEGUS: Legacy ExtraGalactic UV Survey |
13372 | Ana Ines Gomez De Castro, Universidad Complutense de Madrid | Mapping the magnetospheric structure at outburst of the pre-main sequence close binary AK Sco |
13377 | Andrea Mehner, European Southern Observatory - Chile | Essential UV Observations of Eta Carinae's Change of State |
13383 | Mary E. Putman, Columbia University in the City of New York | Measuring the Properties of Dwarf Streams |
13386 | Steven A. Rodney, The Johns Hopkins University | Frontier Field Supernova Search |
13393 | Dennis Zaritsky, University of Arizona | Galaxy Transformation in the Infall Regions of Clusters |
13444 | Bart P. Wakker, University of Wisconsin - Madison | Constraining the size of intergalactic clouds with QSO pairs |
13448 | Andrew J. Fox, Space Telescope Science Institute - ESA | The Closest Galactic Wind: UV Properties of the Milky Way's Nuclear Outflow |
13455 | John Krist, Jet Propulsion Laboratory | The Eccentric Debris Ring Around HD 202628: Signs of Planetary Perturbations |
13456 | Michael McDonald, Massachusetts Institute of Technology | Searching for 300, 000 Degree Gas in the Core of the Phoenix Cluster with HST-COS |
13517 | Matthew A. Malkan, University of California - Los Angeles | WFC3 Infrared Spectroscopic Parallel Survey WISP: A Survey of Star Formation Across Cosmic Time |
13633 | John R. Spencer, Southwest Research Institute | A Kuiper Belt Object for the New Horizons Mission |
13796 | Arlin Crotts, Columbia University in the City of New York | Understanding New Structures Ejected from Recurrent Nova T Pyx |
GO 12893: Study of Small and Cool Kepler Planet Candidates with High Resolution Imaging
The Kepler satellite |
Kepler is a NASA Discovery-class mission, designed to search for extrasolar planets by using high-precision photometric observations to detect transits. Launched on 7 March 2009, Kepler continuously monitored ~100,000 (mainly) solar-type stare within a ~100 square degree region in Cygnus for more than 4 years. Routine observations ceased on May 11 2013 when a second reaction wheel failed; efforts are currently under way to examine the options for restoring observations. Regardless, the mission has been an astounding success. Ground-based observations have successfully detected a couple of dozen transiting planets (e.g. HD 209458); almost all are "hot jupiters", gas giants on short-period orbits which produce a photometric dip of ~10-2 with a period of a few days, with a smattering of neptune-sized "super-Earths". Kepler, in contrast, has identified more than 2,700 exoplanet candidates around over 2,000 candidate host stars. More significantly, the exquisite precision of Kepler's photometric observations enables it to detect the 0.01% transit signature of earth analogues in these systems. A subset of stellar binaries provide one of the main sources of confusion in searching for planetary transits, since "grazing" transits can mimic the planetary signature. This is particularly an issue with Kepler, since the optical system is designed to provide a broad psf, spreading the stellar flux over a large area on the detector to allow high photometric accuracy. As a result, faint eclipsing stellar binaries will contribute to the source counts. Moreover, since the target field is (intentionally) within the Milky Way, there is a significant potential for unresolved stars within the (relatively broad) Kepler psf to increase the total signal, and hence dilute the depth of transits, giving the appearance of a smaller diameter exoplanet. This program is using the high spatial resolution imaging provided by HST to study a subset of the Kepler Earth-like candidates to assess the potential of this effect. |
GO 13364: LEGUS: Legacy ExtraGalactic UV Survey
GO 13455: The Eccentric Debris Ring Around HD 202628: Signs of Planetary Perturbations
HST-STIS imaging of the debris disk around HD 202628 (Paul Kalas) |
Planet formation occurs in circumstellar disks around young stars. Most of the gaseous content of those disks dissipates in less than 10 million years, leaving dusty debris disks that are detectable through reflect light at near-infrared and, to a lesser extent, optical wavelengths. The disk structure is affected by massive bodies (i.e. planets and asteroids), which, through dynamical interactions and resonances, can produce rings and asymmetries. Over the past decade, HST and Spitzer have provided complementary information on this subject, with Spitzer measuring thermal radiation from circumstellar dust and HST providing high-resolution mapping of debris disks in reflected light. Most recently, HST ACS coronagraphic imaging have revealed the presence of a planetary object within the disk of the nearby A star, . Planetary companions to the young (60 Myr-old) F star, HR 8799, have also been imaged by both ground-based telescopes and HST. The ACS coronagraph was associated with the High Resolution Camera, which is no longer functioning; nor is NICMOS. However, coronagraphy is still possible using the occulting bar on the Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph (STIS), and three years ago STIS coronagraphy revealed a debris disk around the relatively nearby (24.4 pc) G dwarf, HD 202628. The system exhibits a sharp inner edge and a cleared central zone, features that are strongly suggestive of planetary-mass companions. The present observations aim to obtain deeper images of the system and probe further details. |
GO 13633: A Kuiper Belt Object for the New Horizons Mission
Hubble Space Telescope images of the Pluto system, including the recently discovered moons, P4 and P5 |
The Kuiper Belt lies beyond the orbit of Neptune, extending from ~30 AU to ~50 AU from the Sun, and includes at least 70,000 objects with diameters exceeding 100 km. Setting aside Pluto, the first trans-Neptunian objects were discovered in the early 1990s. Most are relatively modest in size, with diameters of a few hundred km and photometric properties that suggest an icy composition, similar to Pluto and its main satellite, Charon. In recent years, a handful of substantially larger bodies have been discovered, with diameters of more than 1000 km; indeed, one object, Eris (2003 UB13), is slightly larger than Pluto (2320 km) and 25% more massive. We know the mass for Eris because it has a much lower mass companion, Dysnomia, which orbits Eris with a period of 16 days (see this recent press release ). Pluto itself has at least 5 companions: Charon, which is about 1/7th the mass of Pluto, and the much smaller bodies, Hydra, Nix, P4 and P5 discovered through HST observations within the last few years. The New Horizons Mission was launched on January 19th 2006 with the prime purpose of providing the first detailed examination of Pluto. The Pluto encounter represents the first phase of the originally-proposed mission. Following the fly-by, set for Bastille day in 2015, the aim is to re-direct New Horizons towards one or more smaller members of the Kuiper Belt, with the goal of providing a closer look at these icy bodies. However, New Horizons needs to identify an appropriate target - a KBO with orbital parameters such that New Horizons can use its modest complement of remaining fuel to reach the target. Adding a further complication, Pluto happens to lie within 5 degrees of the Galactic Plane and the consequent high star density has proven a barrier to deep ground-based searches. As a consequence, the New Horizons team has applied for, and received, Hubble time to search an area roughly the size of the full moon to try to identify a suitable target. In an initial pilot program, the New Horizons team identified at least 2 cold, classical KBOs, triggering the full survey. |