CAREER: The Faint Interstellar Medium and Stardial

职业：微弱的星际介质和星晷

• 批准号: 9874670
• 负责人: Peter McCullough
• 金额: $ 30.96万
• 依托单位: University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 1999
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 1999-07-01 至 2004-06-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=9874670&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: CAREER; Faint; Interstellar; Medium; Stardial

A four-year plan to enhance astronomical research and teaching at the University of Illinois and throughout the world will be carried out. The research capitalizes on obtaining new astronomical data optimized for detection of low surface brightness emissions from the Milky Way Galaxy. The research and the teaching activities will take advantage of the new technologies that are available by using robotic telescopes and the World Wide Web (WWW, "the Web").The focus of the research activity is on the faint interstellar medium of the Milky Way. A definitive atlas of the entire sky, observed at the Hydrogen alpha (H-alpha) emission line, will be produced that will be 30 times more sensitive than previous surveys in this area. This new sky atlas will reveal hundreds of new objects, which may then be studied further. Numerous sources of ionization in the interstellar medium of the Milky Way will be identified and specific ones will be studied in depth with spectroscopy. Because of the direct physical relationship of the H-alpha emission and the free-free emission in the Milky Way, the H-alpha emission is a sensitive tracer of free-free emission in the Milky Way. The H-alpha data will permit the removal of contamination of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) data by the Milky Way emissions. The data Milky Way observations will be used to improve the analysis of the data from the MAP and PLANCK satellite missions to observe the CMB. The decontamination will improve the credibility and the sensitivity of the satellite CMB results by allowing spurious signals to be eliminated from the data. The combination of the availability of the H-alpha data and CMB microwave data will allow the measurement of the electron temperature of the warm ionized medium over the entire sky. The results of the data analysis will be used to test new theories for microwave emissions from spinning, charged dust grains that are in the interstellar medium.The research activities will be integrated into education activities by using the "Stardial". The Stardial is an autonomous robotic astronomical camera system that produces images of the night sky. The system was invented specifically to be used for teaching astronomy via the Web. The Stardial supplies small telescope observational capabilities to anyone with access to a "WWW" browser. One objective of this award is to expand the Stardial project to other universities and high schools and to extend the technique so that it may be used on other telescopes. The Stardial program has already been involved in carrying out two years of continuous monitoring of the night sky, and at least three universities and one high school have used it. The use of the Stardial project will be extended by linking it to existing robotic telescopes via the Web. Software for the Web-interface will be written and collaborators with hardware will be solicited, i.e. those with robotic telescopes, to be involved in the Stardial activity. The Web-based interface will provide simple, reliable, and cost-effective access to robotic telescopes to obtain data that may be used for both teaching and research. There will be a software program that will simulate the operation of the each telescope to allow the user to practice prior to using the actual telescope. The interface also will allow the inclusion of human-operated telescopes. Successful teaching activities related to variable stars and asteroids have been developed and these activities will be extended and distributed on the Web.***

将实施一项四年计划，以加强伊利诺伊大学和全世界的天文学研究和教学。 这项研究利用了获得新的天文数据，这些数据是为了探测银河系低表面亮度发射而优化的。 研究和教学活动将利用机器人望远镜和万维网（WWW，“万维网”）所提供的新技术，研究活动的重点是银河系中暗淡的星际介质。将制作一个在氢α（H-α）发射线处观测的整个天空的权威地图集，其灵敏度将比该地区以前的调查高30倍。 这张新的天空地图集将揭示数百个新的天体，然后可能会进一步研究。 将确定银河系星际介质中的许多电离源，并将用光谱学深入研究具体的电离源。 由于H-alpha辐射与银河系中的自由-自由辐射有着直接的物理联系，因此H-alpha辐射是银河系中自由-自由辐射的一种灵敏示踪剂。 H-alpha数据将允许消除银河系辐射对宇宙微波背景（CMB）数据的污染。 银河系观测数据将用于改进对MAP和普朗克卫星观测CMB任务数据的分析。 消除污染将提高卫星CMB结果的可信度和灵敏度，因为可以从数据中消除虚假信号。 将H-alpha数据和CMB微波数据结合起来，就可以测量整个天空中温暖电离介质的电子温度。 数据分析的结果将用于检验星际介质中旋转带电尘埃微粒微波辐射的新理论，研究活动将通过使用“Stardial”纳入教育活动。 Stardial是一个自动天文相机系统，可以拍摄夜空图像。 该系统是专门为通过网络教授天文学而发明的。 Stardial为任何可以访问“WWW”浏览器的人提供小型望远镜观测能力。 该奖项的一个目标是将Stardial项目扩展到其他大学和高中，并将该技术推广到其他望远镜上。 Stardial项目已经参与了对夜空进行为期两年的连续监测，至少有三所大学和一所高中使用了它。Stardial项目的使用范围将通过网络与现有的机器人望远镜连接起来。 将编写网络界面软件，并征求拥有硬件的合作者（即拥有机器人望远镜的合作者）参与Stardial活动。 基于网络的界面将提供简单、可靠和具有成本效益的机器人望远镜访问，以获得可用于教学和研究的数据。 将有一个软件程序，将模拟每个望远镜的操作，使用户能够在使用实际望远镜之前进行练习。 该接口还将允许包含人工操作的望远镜。 已经成功地开展了与变星和小行星有关的教学活动，这些活动将在网上推广和传播。