Awash in a Stream of Asteroids: Using ground-based facilities to observe NEO "fly-bys"

淹没在小行星流中：使用地面设施观察近地天体“飞越”

• 批准号: 1202680
• 负责人: Nicholas Moskovitz
• 金额: $ 8.9万
• 依托单位: Moskovitz Nicholas A
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Fellowship Award
• 财政年份: 2012
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2012-09-01 至 2015-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1202680&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Awash; Stream; Asteroids; Using; ground

Dr. Nicholas Moskovitz is awarded an NSF Astronomy and Astrophysics Postdoctoral Fellowship to carry out a program of research and education at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. This project is focused on understanding the physical and compositional properties of asteroids as they pass by Earth at very small distances. The fellow will explore an area of planetary science that has only recently been enabled by the rapid rate of new near-Earth asteroid (NEO) discoveries. This will not only have wide implications for understanding the compositional and physical properties of NEOs but will also be relevant to multidisciplinary studies involving the topics of impact hazards, meteoritics and cosmochemistry, space craft missions, radar astronomy, and Solar System dynamics.With steadily increasing numbers of catalogued NEOs, investigators are reaching a point where close encounters with Earth are no longer detected just a few days beforehand but can be predicted months or years in advance. During close encounters small bodies in unexplored size regimes become observationally accessible across a wide range of wavelengths and with a variety of ground-based facilities. The fellow will take advantage of these encounters by conducting targeted spectroscopic and photometric campaigns in each year of his fellowship. These observations will (1) provide insight on the compositional properties of small asteroids, (2) establish links between meteorites on Earth and their immediate parent bodies in space, (3) investigate the role of observing geometry on reflectance measurements of planetary bodies, and (4) look for asteroid surface heterogeneity which could provide clues about regolith and thermo-physical properties.The broader impacts of this project include a significant educational component. The fellow's educational plan involves a combination of mentoring, curriculum development, and teaching, all focused on training undergraduates in innovative ways on the foundations of observational astronomy. The fellow will mentor several undergraduates over the course of the fellowship in a structured manner using inquiry-based methods. By the second year the fellow will have developed a set of lessons and exercises that he will incorporate and teach in an observational astronomy course. The program is designed to not only advance the learning and understanding of undergraduates through personalized mentoring and real research projects, but it will also incorporate new components into MIT?s observational astronomy course. The undergraduates involved in this program will receive at an early stage in their careers the training necessary for future success as observational astronomers. In the long-term this experience will provide the fellow an opportunity to develop a course curriculum that can continue to be implemented in the years beyond this fellowship. More broadly, the topic of NEO close encounters garners significant public curiosity and provides an excellent opportunity for the fellow to give public talks to enhance scientific understanding within our society throughout his fellowship.

Nicholas Moskovitz博士被授予NSF天文学和天体物理学博士后奖学金，在马萨诸塞州理工学院开展研究和教育计划。 该项目的重点是了解小行星在非常小的距离上经过地球时的物理和成分特性。 该研究员将探索行星科学的一个领域，该领域直到最近才因新的近地小行星（NEO）的快速发现而成为可能。 这不仅将对了解近地天体的组成和物理特性产生广泛影响，而且还将与涉及撞击危险、陨石学和宇宙化学、航天器飞行任务、雷达天文学和太阳系动力学等专题的多学科研究有关。研究人员正在达到这样一个程度，即与地球的近距离接触不再仅仅在几天前被发现，而是可以提前数月或数年预测。 在近距离接触期间，可以通过各种地面设施在各种波长范围内观测到未探测到的小天体。 该研究员将利用这些遭遇，在他的研究金的每一年进行有针对性的光谱和光度运动。 这些观测将（1）提供对小行星组成特性的深入了解，（2）建立地球上的陨石与其在太空中的直接母体之间的联系，（3）调查观测几何学对行星体反射率测量的作用，以及（4）寻找小行星表面的异质性，这可以提供有关风化层和热的线索。该项目的更广泛影响包括一个重要的教育部分。 该研究员的教育计划涉及指导，课程开发和教学的结合，所有这些都侧重于以创新的方式在观测天文学的基础上培训本科生。 该研究员将指导几个本科生在奖学金的过程中，在一个结构化的方式使用基于调查的方法。 到第二年，研究员将制定一套课程和练习，他将纳入并教授观测天文学课程。 该计划的目的不仅是通过个性化的指导和真实的研究项目来促进本科生的学习和理解，而且还将把新的组成部分纳入麻省理工学院？观测天文学课程。 参与该计划的本科生将在其职业生涯的早期阶段接受必要的培训，以便将来成功地成为观测天文学家。 从长远来看，这一经验将为研究员提供一个机会，制定一个课程，可以继续在本奖学金后的几年实施。 更广泛地说，近地天体近距离接触的主题引起了公众的极大好奇，并为研究员提供了一个极好的机会，在整个研究期间进行公开演讲，以增进我们社会的科学理解。