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Student research and investigations is a key component of the HOU
project. Many students have used HOU to explore astronomical phenomena
and have written web-based reports. Some examples of their work is provided
here.
ASTEROIDS
- International
Asteroid Search Campaign
- 2012 April 21. Trans-Neptunian Object (TNO) Discovery. Tom Vorobjov directs the IASC Data Reduction Team (IDaRT). Using images from Bob Holmes of the Astronomical Research Institute (Westfield, IL) dated April 19th, he discovered a trans-Neptunian object (TNO) located outside the orbit of Pluto. Its diameter is approximately 200 km. Designated at 2012 HH2 by the Minor Planet Center, the orbit varies from 29.5 AU to 46 AU from the Sun. It has an orbital period of 232 years (orbit diagram below). The Catalina Sky Survey (Tucson, AZ) and the Magdalena Ridge Observatory (Socorro, NM) provided follow-ups. These were important in helping to determine the orbit and establish that 2012 HH2 resides in the outer Solar System. This is a most important discovery...and a first for IASC. Congratulations to Tom and Bob!! ---Dr. Patrick Miller, Hardin-Simmons University.
[click to see larger image]
- 2010 Aug 13. Delhi students find main belt asteroid. by Madhur Tankha, for The Hindu. Excerpt: Amanjot Singh and Sahil Wadhwa, both students of Ryan International in Rohini here, have created history of sorts by discovering the main belt asteroid named 2010 PO24.
The discovery, made on August 6, is unique as this is the first time an asteroid has been spotted by any school in the country. Amanjot and Sahil found it while participating in the “All-India Asteroid Search Campaign,” conducted by the Science Popularisation Association of Communicators and Educators (SPACE) in collaboration with the International Astronomical Search Collaboration.
Congratulating the students, SPACE president C.B. Devgun said it was a proud moment for the country's student community. “Through this programme, we have given school children an opportunity to be involved in real time science and an exciting opportunity to be at the forefront of research at the international level....
- 2010 March. CHHS students participate in an out-of-this-world program. Excerpt: Colleyville Heritage High School is one of only five schools nationwide invited to participate in an asteroid-search campaign using NASA’s Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE), a sky-mapping spacecraft located in space to scan for comets, asteroids and other unknown celestial bodies.
...The program allows students to analyze images of near-Earth objects, known as NEOs, which have been discovered recently using WISE technology. NEOs are asteroids and comets with orbits that pass relatively close to Earth's path around the sun. These images are from two Faulkes Telescopes, which are located in Hawaii and Australia and are directly controllable over the Internet.
Leslie Howell, CHHS astronomy teacher, explained that the students use images from the ground-based telescopes to verify and make observations about possible asteroids identified by the WISE technology. Working collectively, CHHS students and their partnering U.K. school use an interactive software tool specifically designed for scientific photography to analyze their respective image sets and prepare reports for submission to the Minor Planet Center in Cambridge, Mass.
“Our most recent observation was of an asteroid identified by CHHS students Dylan Adams, Cole Stuart, Michelle Warnock and Remi Dimarco,” Howell said. “Fortunately, this asteroid is not a threat to Earth, but the objective of the program is to track asteroids and locate new ones that could be on a collision course with Earth.”...
- Astronomical
Research Institute (ARI)
- HOU Asteroid
Search
- Excerpt
from Feb 2005 article The Sloan
Digital Sky Survey
by Michael A.
Strauss and Gillian R. Knapp.
Sky & Telescope
magazine.
- Asteroid Research Paper by HOU student:
Using
Astronomical Databases in the Search for Minor Planets [MS
Word file]
by Breanne N. Morelli, 5 April 2006.
Mr. Tim Spuck, Instructor
Oil City High School, Oil City, PA
ABSTRACT: With an ever increasing number
of databases of digital sky survey images, data mining has become
an intense field of study yielding significant results. Data-mining
projects have led to the discovery of unknown minor planets as
well as the detection of their relative positions to our planet.
However, the lack of inexpensive technology and software in the
past has hindered large scale implementation of research by high
school students. That appears to have changed. In this study
a student at Oil City High School conducting astronomical data
mining research has provided the Minor Planet Center with data
for one known and two unknown minor planets.
- Small Telescope Parallax Group, which includes
several HOU teacher leaders, looks for asteroids
that come relatively close to Earth, whose parallax
(and hence distance) can be determined by equipment
available to amateur astronomers. See results
for asteroid 1998WT.
- High School Students Discover Kuiper Belt Asteroid(November 20, 1998).
SUPERNOVAE
 March
28, 2006: HOU Teacher, Harlan DeVore, and astronomer, Bob
Holmes, provide research opportunities for students.
Photo by Andrew Craft |
| A NBC
news video shows Harlan's students searching for supernovae!
(requires
Windows, Flash, and Internet Explorer.) |
- News
article about discovery of Supernova 2006al,
in Abell Galaxy Cluster 1066 by Devore and
Holmes.
- Images
of Supernova 2006al, with image processing
by Harlan, using HOU astronomy software.
1 May 2006.
From: Bob Holmes (Astronomical
Research Institute - ARI)
Congratulations Cape Fear High School student Brian Graves and
instructor Harlan Devore on the discovery of Supernova 2006bu!
I want to thank everyone who conducted observations using Astronomical
Research images for this 2005-2006 school year. You have done
an outstanding job. I especially want to thank Harlan Devore
and Patrick Miller for their ground breaking work they have done
in Image Subtraction of the ARI images. Even though we have a
ways to go in producing conclusive results, I feel that these
efforts are just the beginning of future for discoveries for
everyone on the team.
See table
of NEOs that have been measured by students
and instructors and data sent to the Minor Planet
Center. |
Join the HOU Collaborating
Amateur Astronomers' network
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