Collaborative Research: Backyard Worlds - Characterizing Our Nearest Neighbors Through Citizen Science

合作研究：后院世界 - 通过公民科学描述我们最近的邻居

• 批准号: 2007068
• 负责人: Evgenya Shkolnik
• 金额: $ 1.19万
• 依托单位: Arizona State University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2020-09-01 至 2022-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2007068&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Research; Backyard; Worlds; Characterizing

Brown dwarfs are objects that form like stars, but are not massive enough to shine with starlight. Recent discoveries point to an undiscovered population of brown dwarfs and rogue planets in the solar neighborhood. The Backyard Worlds: Planet 9 citizen science project (BYW) engages with volunteers from around the world using infrared images from the Wide-Field Infrared Survey Explorer to identify overlooked brown dwarfs in the immediate vicinity of the Sun. Over 150,000 volunteers have already contributed to the BYW project, identifying more than 1600 previously unknown brown dwarfs. The team will use this treasure trove of brown dwarf candidates uncovered through the BYW project to identify astrophysically interesting sources for detailed individual studies. The team will also extend the reach of the BYW project by creating educational materials based around the BYW science case and investigation strategy to be employed at the American Museum of Natural History and made available to the public.This project will support a robust ground-based follow-up program to complement the Backyard Worlds (BYW) archival research project. Through a combination of photometry and spectroscopy, the team will observe an array of high-priority brown dwarf candidates for further analysis. These observations will allow for detailed individual studies of new exotic objects (e.g., extremely cold brown dwarfs, co-moving companions) to determine their physical parameters (e.g., effective temperatures, ages, approximate distances) and will provide the data needed for a more accurate determination of the local brown dwarf space density. These efforts will leverage the hard work of citizen scientists to identify the nearest, optimal brown dwarfs as targets for detailed characterizations with the forthcoming James Webb Space Telescope and ground-based extremely large telescopes (ELTs).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.

棕矮星是一种类似恒星的天体，但质量不够大，无法发出星光。最近的发现指出，在太阳附近有一群未被发现的褐矮星和流氓行星。后院世界：行星9公民科学项目（BYW）与来自世界各地的志愿者合作，使用宽视场红外巡天探测器的红外图像来识别太阳附近被忽视的褐矮星。超过150，000名志愿者已经为BYW项目做出了贡献，识别了1600多颗以前未知的褐矮星。该团队将利用通过BYW项目发现的褐矮星候选者的宝库来确定详细的个人研究的天体物理学有趣的来源。该团队还将通过创建基于BYW科学案例和调查策略的教育材料来扩展BYW项目的覆盖范围，这些材料将在美国自然历史博物馆使用并向公众提供。该项目将支持一个强大的地面后续计划，以补充后院世界（BYW）档案研究项目。通过光度学和光谱学的结合，该团队将观察一系列高优先级的褐矮星候选者，以进行进一步分析。这些观测将允许对新的奇异物体进行详细的个体研究（例如，极冷的褐矮星，共同运动的伴星）来确定它们的物理参数（例如，有效温度、年龄、近似距离），并将提供更准确地确定当地褐矮星空间密度所需的数据。这些努力将利用公民科学家的辛勤工作，以确定最近的，最佳的褐矮星作为目标，用即将到来的詹姆斯韦伯太空望远镜和地基超大望远镜（ELT）进行详细的表征。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并被认为值得通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估来支持。