Completing the Galactic Plane Infrared Polarization Survey (GPIPS)

穿过银河系星际介质（ISM）的磁场很少被揭示，它在云和恒星形成中的作用也不清楚。丹·克莱门斯博士（波士顿大学）和他的团队正在解决这些问题，他们使用强大的仪器（Mimir，一种近红外宽视场成像偏振计），加上大量的观测时间（每年大约50个晚上，有关键项目状态），在亚利桑那州弗拉格斯塔夫市外的1.8米珀金斯望远镜上。目前，该团队正在进行银河面红外偏振调查（GPIPS）的望远镜观测，并将通过该奖项在未来四年内完成所有GPIPS观测。GPIPS将现有的光学/红外（OIR）探测器的ISM磁场扩展了4到5个数量级，达到大约50万颗恒星的偏振，并显示出比使用OIR方法之前看到的距离远5倍的磁场，到达和超越最近的螺旋臂，穿过乌云，达到25等的视觉消光。GPIPS代表了探测银河系磁场可用数据的巨大增长。内中层区域提供了丰富的有关恒星目标的相关数据，并揭示了漫射和稠密ISM中各种明显不同的环境。GPIPS将揭示的新的磁场洞察力将有助于测试许多尺寸尺度的模型，以衡量磁场在银河系中广泛的ISM环境中的作用。公开发布高质量、校准良好的数据产品将使其他天文学家能够挖掘具有变革性的GPIPS数据，以获得新的发现，并为其他研究带来重要的见解。GPIPS开创的方法和途径将指导未来的大规模和后续研究。在调查的前三年，GPIPS和Mimir对研究生的职业发展产生了重大影响，包括迄今为止约30名波士顿大学学生的顶点天文学经验，并使访客和合作者能够获得各种项目的新数据。该团队有一套公开可用的软件工具和网站，可以轻松有效地访问Mimir数据并进行科学研究。在接下来的四年里，该团队将通过开发和提供一系列网络广播和播客来提高这个基础的影响力，这些网络广播和播客既面向公众，也面向研究界（GPIPS数据产品、Mimir仪器和软件），主题包括红外天文学、偏振学和磁场。最后，团队成员将与波士顿大学科学可视化中心合作，开发可导出的工具和/或显示，以查看和交互GPIPS数据集的三维分解及其与ISM的其他示踪物的关系。

The magnetic field threading the Galaxy's interstellar medium (ISM) is poorly revealed and its roles in cloud and star formation are unclear. Dr. Dan Clemens (Boston University) and his team are addressing these problems using a powerful instrument (Mimir, a near-infrared wide-field imaging polarimeter) coupled with substantial observing time (about 50 nights per year, with key project status) on the 1.8-meter Perkins telescope outside Flagstaff, Arizona. Presently, the team is about midway through the telescopic observations comprising the Galactic Plane Infrared Polarization Survey (GPIPS) and, through this award, will complete all GPIPS observations over the next four years. GPIPS expands existing optical/infrared (OIR) probes of the ISM magnetic field by four to five orders of magnitude, to about 500,000 stellar polarizations, and reveals the field five times more distant than seen before using OIR methods, to and beyond the nearest spiral arm and through dark clouds to a visual extinction of 25 magnitudes. GPIPS represents a huge increase in the data available for probing the Milky Way's magnetic field. The inner midplane region offers a wealth of correlative data concerning the stellar targets, as well as revealing a wide variety of distinctly different environments in the diffuse and dense ISM. The new magnetic field insight GPIPS will uncover will help test models across many size scales to gauge the role of the magnetic field in a wide range of ISM environments in the Galaxy.The public release of high-quality, well-calibrated data products will allow other astronomers to mine the transformative GPIPS data for new discoveries, and to bring vital insight to other studies. The methods and approaches pioneered by GPIPS will guide future large-scale and follow-up studies. During the first three years of the survey, GPIPS and Mimir have had major impacts on the career development of research students, comprising the capstone astronomical experience for about 30 Boston University students to date, and enabling visitors and collaborators to obtain new data for a wide variety of projects. The team's suite of publically-available software tools and web sites make access to, and science with, Mimir data easy and efficient. Over the next four years, the team will leverage this base to higher levels of impact by developing and serving out a series of webcasts and podcasts, both for the general public on topics such as infrared astronomy, polarimetry, and magnetic fields, and for the research community (the GPIPS data products, the Mimir instrument and software). Finally, members of the team will work with the Boston University Scientific Visualization Center to develop exportable tools and/or shows to view and interact with the three-dimensional decomposition of the GPIPS data set and its relationships to other tracers of the ISM.