Completing the WIYN Speckle Survey: Toward the Thin and Thick Disk Binary Populations

该奖项是根据2009年美国复苏和再投资法案(公法111-5)资助的。在之前由美国国家科学基金会资助的工作中，霍奇博士和他的团队开发了一种独特的高角度分辨率观测恒星的仪器。该项目将在亚利桑那州的WIYN望远镜上使用这台仪器来完成对银河系各种恒星群中疑似和可能的双星的广泛调查。由此得到的恒星质量-半径关系数据将为恒星结构和演化理论提供许多潜在的测试。这些数据将与最近的光谱调查，特别是日内瓦-哥本哈根星表中的信息结合使用，以在恒星天体物理以及星系结构和演化的经验知识方面取得实质性进展。结合现有和即将到来的光谱测量数据，观测数据和恒星演化模型之间的可靠比较可以用许多双星系统来完成。重要的是，新数据将允许测量诸如系统年龄和氦丰度之类的量。霍奇博士还将在南康涅狄格州立大学(SCSU)物理系定期举办一系列物理和天文学研讨会。他将与该地区的高中物理教师和加州州立大学久负盛名的物理俱乐部合作，通过这些讲座帮助向康涅狄格州代表性不足的群体推广科学职业。通过拟议的工作为SCSU的本科生提供建议，将有助于满足美国对训练有素、有研究能力的科学和工程专业人员的需求。

This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5).In previous NSF-funded work, Dr. Horch and his group have developed a unique instrument for observing stars at high angular resolution. This project will use this instrument at the WIYN telescope in Arizona to complete an extensive survey of suspected and probable binary stars in various stellar populations of the Milky Way. The resulting data on the stellar mass-radius relation will provide many potential tests of stellar structure and evolution theory. The data will be used in combination with information from recent spectroscopic surveys, particularly the Geneva-Copenhagen Catalog, to make substantial progress in empirical knowledge of stellar astrophysics as well as galactic structure and evolution. In combination with existing and forthcoming spectroscopic survey data, robust comparisons between the observations and stellar evolution models can be completed with many binary systems. Importantly, the new data will permit the measurement of such quantities such as the system age and the helium abundance. Dr. Horch will also create a regular series of physics and astronomy seminars in the Department of Physics at Southern Connecticut State University (SCSU). He will work work with high school physics teachers in the area and with the well-established Physics Club at SCSU to help promote careers in science to underrepresented groups in Connecticut through these talks. The advising of undergraduate Physics students at SCSU through the proposed work will help serve the need for highly-trained, research-capable science and engineering professionals in the U.S.