WoU-MMA, Collaborative Research: Searches After Gravitational Waves Using Arizona's Observatories

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The recent detection of Gravitational Waves and light from a neutron star merger opens up the era of multimessenger astrophysics with direct evidence for the origin of short gamma ray bursts, heavy element production, and relativistic outflows launched from the mergers of compact collapsed objects (neutron stars and black holes). This new discovery space will be optimized by increasing the detection rate and monitoring of the electromagnetic (EM) counterparts of GW and high energy neutrino events in the northern hemisphere. This will be accomplished by rapidly locating the position of this emission using the Catalina Sky Survey after an alert, informing the astronomical community of its location and immediately bringing on-line the Searches After Gravitational-waves Using Arizona's Observatories (SAGURAO) network of telescopes ( 6.5mMMT, 2x8 m LBT, as well as the 10 m Keck in Hawaii and others) to monitor these events with deep imaging and integral field unit (IFU) spectroscopy. A set of algorithms to prioritize EM counterpart candidates for follow-up observation and a website to provide a centralized location to organize candidates in real time to disseminate the information to the scientific community will be developed to insure coordination of resources for this research. The PIs will partnership with Harold Washington University in Chicago to mentor two underrepresented minority community college students by providing them with a two year summer course on astronomical research to develop their STEM skills.The grant addresses the needs of the WoU-MMA program in the northern hemisphere. It will organize the astronomical observational resources in Arizona to detect and localize the optical electromagnetic window for the observation of gravitational waves and neutron star mergers. After being informed of an event by Ligo/Virgo or IceCube, the Catalina Sky Survey will be used to discover and quickly localize the optical counterpart and immediately send out an alert to the astronomical community. This will be followed by observations using the Searches After Gravitational-waves Using Arizona's Observatories (SAGURAO) PIs consortium of telescope facilities in Arizona and Hawaii as well as other facilities to image and spectroscopically study the optical counterparts and their environments. A set of algorithms to prioritize EM counterpart candidates for follow-up observation and a website to provide a centralized location to organize candidates in real time and disseminate the information to the scientific community will be developed to insure coordination of resources for this research. This program advances the goals of the NSF Windows on the Universe Big-Idea.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.