Announcements 2017

21 December 2017: Project & Science News On December 13th LSST was featured on ABC 7 News with footage from the SLAC National Accelerator Lab. An all-project LSST Joint Technical Meeting will not be held in 2018 as in past years; instead, individual subsystem meetings will be held in the spring. Dates for each of these meetings can now be found in the Digest meeting list below, or on the LSST website. The first of 21 Science Rafts for LSST’s 3.2-gigapixel camera have arrived at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory from Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL). The rafts are arrays of nine imaging sensors, or CCDs, each with 4K-by-4K pixels. To date, 60% of the camera’s sensors have been received at BNL, and delivery rate is on track to maintain the current schedule. Click here for photos of the arrival of the Science Rafts at SLAC. Another milestone for the Telescope Mount Assembly (TMA) in …

18 December 2017: Using the Gemini South telescope, researchers extracted spectra from extremely faint optical sources which they determined are nurseries of massive stars around an elliptical galaxy. Indeed, the sources were so faint that they were previously undetected and only revealed using ~4 hour exposures with the Gemini Multi-Object Spectrograph (GMOS). It is speculated that the nurseries formed as the result of a past galactic merger. Using a novel observational technique, called Multi-Slit Imaging Spectroscopy (MSIS) a team, lead by Fernanda Urrutia (Universidad de La Serena and Gemini Observatory), found a new generation of star clusters around the elliptical galaxy, NGC 2865. “The main result of our work is that we were able to detect all the clusters of massive stars around this elliptical galaxy,” said Urrutia. “Elliptical galaxies normally don’t have enough gas to form massive stars, thus we did not expect to observe star formation inside the galaxy, much less …

5 December 2017: LSST News Digest Addendum, December 6, 2017 The following item was not included in the December 5 LSST News Digest:Reminder: The deadline for submitting to the 2018 LSST Corporation Enabling Science Call for Proposals is at Midnight (PST) on Monday, December 18. Information and instructions for submitting a proposal can be found at this link (login required) Project & Science News Seeing the Beginning of Time, a NCSA-produced documentary that includes a segment on LSST, will be screened during the upcoming American Astronomical Society (AAS) meeting, on Tuesday, January 9 from 7:30 - 8:30 p.m. Check the final AAS meeting schedule for the screening location and other details; more information about the movie can be found here. The Telescope Mount Assembly (TMA) continues to come together at subcontractor Asturfeito in Spain; this time-lapse videoshows the top end of the telescope being mounted onto the elevation structure. The TMA is currently …

29 November 2017: Gemini observations played a critical role in research by scientists at the University of Washington in their quest to identify an object which appears to be “photobombing” the Andromeda Galaxy. The researchers determined that rather than being a binary star system within the neighboring Andromeda Galaxy, as previously thought, the object is really a distant galaxy containing a supermassive black hole binary – a pair of black holes orbiting each other very closely within the galaxy’s core. “The Gemini spectroscopic observations revealed the true nature of this puzzling object as a background galaxy with an active nucleus,” said Gemini’s Chief Scientist John Blakeslee. “Careful analysis of the extreme velocities seen in the spectra then led the team to suspect that the supermassive black hole in the galaxy’s center is actually a tightly bound binary.” Observations by NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory first cast suspicion that things weren’t as simple as they …

21 November 2017: Project & Science News A reminder: The LSST Town Hall at AAS 231 will take place on Wednesday, January 10th, 2018, at 7:30 pm. This Town Hall will include developments in the planning of LSST’s observing strategy and commissioning policies, and updates from the LSST Corporation and Science Collaborations on community preparations for science with LSST. A successful LSST Safety Review, conducted by the Safety Council, took place in Chile on November 7-9, 2017. The focus of this review was to assess Chilean Base Facility and Summit Site safety processes. The presentations and tours demonstrated that safety has been effectively integrated into all levels of the Project, and that there is a high level of commitment to safety by LSST Project Management. Click here for a group photo from the event. LSST’s fiber-optic network came one milestone closer to activation last week; the AURA LSST Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing (DWDM) …

7 November 2017: Project & Science News A Day in the Life of LSST Construction, Part III is now available! We received 142 submissions which were compiled into an 11-minute video that can be viewed in the LSST Gallery and on our YouTube channel. Thank you to all contributors, and to LSST Graphic Designer Emily Acosta for assembling the images, videos, and captions together into the final product. Telescope & Site team members Tomislav Vucina and Doug Neil travelled to Germany recently to review progress on the Coating Plant, which will be used to aluminize both LSST’s Primary/Tertiary Mirror (M1M3) and its Secondary Mirror (M2). At the MAN factory in Deggendorf, the LSST Team verified that major components of the Coating Chamber Assembly are in place. The team then traveled to the Von Ardenne facilities in Dresden, where they inspected the Washing Boom and other components of the already-assembled Washing Station. Photos from …

24 October 2017: Project & Science News On the summit of Cerro Pachón, the grouting of the azimuth/dome interface has been completed (click here for a photo). Subcontractor EIE recently held an onsite assembly plan review to confirm the sequence of construction activities, and plans to begin installation of the azimuth rail sections this week. The Primary/Tertiary Mirror (M1M3) cell underwent vacuum testing at subcontractor CAID last week, to identify and eliminate any leaks in the cell. Click here for a photo of the sealed cell during testing, which concluded successfully on October 18. Installation of static supports is scheduled to get underway this week. The first filter for the Commissioning Camera has been completed and has arrived at the Project Office in Tucson. The i-band filter, which is about 12 inches in diameter, is currently undergoing testing in the optics lab. Longtime LSST Communications Manager Suzanne Jacoby will transition to the role …

16 October 2017: The precious elements in our Earth-bound bling are thought to have been forged in ancient fiery cataclysms, when pairs of neutron stars spiraled together and merged into black holes. Telescopes at CTIO recently pinpointed and studied the light from such a merger. The first optical counterpart to a gravitational wave detection, the discovery confirms that merging neutron star binaries are indeed major cosmic production sites of rare heavy elements.

10 October 2017: Project & Science News The dates and location for the 2018 LSST Project and Community Workshop have been selected; the event will be held at the Hilton El Conquistador in Tucson, AZ on August 13-17, 2018. The Education and Public Outreach (EPO) team recently completed a successful review, which was held in Tucson on September 26-28. EPO has made substantial progress in the last year, and recommendations from this review will be used to guide further development of the EPO program’s infrastructure. Read more about the review, and EPO’s exciting plans to engage the public with LSST data, in this blog post. Congratulations to Vincent Riot (LLNL), who has been appointed the permanent Project Manager for the LSST Camera. Vincent has held this position on an interim basis for just over a year, effectively managing challenges in order to keep the camera project on track. Members of the Telescope & …

2 October 2017: A stunning collection of images showcased in the 8th International Earth & Sky Photo Contest highlights the beauty of the night sky and the battle with light pollution. The contest is a collaboration between NOAO, the World at Night (TWAN), and Global Astronomy Month, a program of Astronomers Without Borders (AWB). NOAO astronomer Connie Walker, recent president of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific and director of the Globe at Night program, served as one of the contest judges.

26 September 2017: Project & Science News The AURA Management Council for LSST (AMCL) meeting took place September 14-15 in Tucson. The Council met with Project leadership to evaluate and discuss the current state of LSST. They also had access to reports from the recent Joint Status Review and Director’s Review, and were able to productively discuss topics raised in both of these meetings. Many LSST team members traveled to the path of totality for last month’s total solar eclipse and returned with impressive photos and stories to share. You can read about the experiences of Associate Scientist Keith Bechtol and Project Scientist Chuck Claver in this recent blog post. LSST Project Manager Victor Krabbendam led an NSF visit to the LSST sites in Chile on September 20-22. The group toured the summit installations on Cerro Pachón as well as the LSST Base Facility construction in the AURA Recinto in La Serena. The …

22 September 2017: Gemini astronomer Tom Geballe describes his recent infrared spectroscopic observations of a mysterious quintuplet of stars. Each of these stars is embedded in its own cocoon of dust in a cluster of massive stars near the center of the Milky Way. The research, using the Gemini Near Infrared Spectrograph (GNIRS) and Near-infrared Integral Field Spectrometer (NIFS) on the Gemini North telescope, confirms that four of the five stars are evolved massive stars which have expelled their outer hydrogen layers, and are rapidly approaching the explosive ends of their relatively short lives. Until this work astronomers were unable to detect the stars inside the cocoons and thereby directly discern their natures. The existence of this Infrared Quintuplet is yet another illustration of the effects of high densities of massive stars in some clusters and of the extreme conditions at the very heart of our galaxy. Most objects in the center of …

14 September 2017: Project & Science News The NSF/DOE Joint Status Review (JSR) took place in Tucson Sept 6-8, in parallel with a separate Earned Value Management System surveillance review covering only the NSF-funded activities. The JSR committee was charged with assessing the current status of the project and to evaluate plans for the future, with emphasis on the next year of construction. The overall consensus of the review committee is that the Project is going very well. This Thursday, Sept 14 the day for LSST Project participants to submit photos for LSST’s next “Day in the Life” (DITL) video. This is our 3rd DITL video and again we hope to get a view of the full breadth of LSST effort being applied on a typical day in LSST construction. Previous versions of the video can be found at the LSST YouTube channel. Updated information on the LSST Deep Drilling Fields has been …

11 September 2017: Astronomers using the Gemini Observatory and the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope have discovered remarkable differences in the abundance of heavier elements, and the Lithium content, in a binary star pair. The research team speculates that this difference is caused by the engulfment of rocky planets early in the system’s evolution which enriched one of the stars. The work also hints at a formation scenario resulting in gas giant planets forming relatively far from their host star. A team of astronomers led by Carlos Saffe (Instituto de Ciencias Astronómicas, de la Tierra y el Espacio, Argentina) observed the peculiar binary system called HAT-P-4, which includes a confirmed exoplanet orbiting one of the stars in the pair. The team used the 8-meter Gemini North Telescope and the Gemini Remote Access to CFHT ESPaDOnS Spectrograph (GRACES) located at the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope to perform high-resolution spectroscopy of the two stars. These spectra revealed that the star …

29 August 2017: Project & Science News LSST 2017 wrapped up on August 18th, ending a productive week of presentations, conversations, and collaboration. Over 260 participants gathered for the traditional group photo, and plenary slides have been linked to the workshop agenda. The LSST Project Science Team is hosting a series of presentations for Science Collaboration Chairs based on topics requested by the Chairs. These presentations have been linked to our public website For Scientists page; new talks will be uploaded as they become available. If you are in a Science Collaboration and are interested in a specific topic, please get in touch with your Chair. Two talks on LSST are scheduled for October 16 2017 at the Division for Planetary Sciences (DPS) meeting: one is on LSST as a NEO Discovery Machine, and another is on LSST Data Products and Tools for Solar System science. Meg Schwamb and David Trilling, co-chairs of …

8 August 2017: Project News We’ve just received confirmation that the LSST Town Hall at AAS 231 will take place on Wednesday, January 10th, 2018 at 7:30 pm. Given LSST’s increasing focus on commissioning and operations planning, this Town Hall will focus on developments in the planning of LSST’s observing strategy and commissioning policies. Representation from the LSST Corporation and Science Collaborations will also briefly highlight key, ongoing initiatives to help the community prepare for science with LSST. The countdown to LSST 2017 continues! Don’t forget to review the most recent agenda when making your plans; if you have questions, please ask them on Slack channel #lsst2017 or on the LSST Community forum. An Ash Dome was safely lifted and installed on the Auxiliary Telescope on Cerro Pachón on August 3. Details about this exciting development can be found in this week’s blog post. The successful installation of a Camera Data Acquisition System …

3 August 2017: New results from the Dark Energy Survey confirm that the Universe is mostly made of dark energy (70%) and dark matter (26%), with normal baryonic matter comprising just a smidge (4%). In other words, the Universe is mostly made of stuff we don’t understand! The results of the survey, which is being carried out with DECam on the CTIO Blanco telescope, were derived from high precision maps of gravitational lensing and large scale structure.

2 August 2017: Gemini confirms a new class of variable stars called Blue Large-Amplitude Pulsators. They are significantly bluer than main sequence stars of the same luminosity demonstrating that they are relatively hot. The new pulsating stars vary with periods ranging from 20 to 40 minutes and amplitudes spanning 0.2 – 0.4 magnitude. These characteristics have not been observed in any known hot pulsators. Astronomers using the Multi-Object Spectrograph (GMOS) on the Gemini South telescope have confirmed a new class of variable stars called Blue Large-Amplitude Pulsators (BLAPs). Pawel Pietrukowicz (Warsaw University Observatory, Poland) led the study as part of the Optical Gravitational Lensing Experiment (OGLE), a variability sky survey conducted on the 1.3-meter Warsaw Telescope at Las Campanas Observatory, Chile. Following up on the team’s discovery of 14 candidate stars the team used GMOS to obtain spectra for three of the candidates. The Gemini data confirmed these stars have helium-rich atmospheres and …

25 July 2017: Project News LSST 2017 is fast approaching! More than 240 participants have registered for the August 14-18 meeting, and the detailed agenda has been posted. Changes are still being made, so check back before the meeting to see the most up-to-date version. LSST Data Management Subsystem Scientist Mario Juric gave a presentation titled What to Expect of the LSST Archive: The LSST Science Platform at the LSST Science Collaboration Chairs/Project Science Team meeting on July 18th. Slides from his talk are available here. Dr. Amanda Bauer, Head of Education and Public Outreach, presented LSST Education and Public Outreach at the same meeting; her slides can be viewed here. The azimuth structure of the Telescope Mount Assembly (TMA), which is supported on a set of six azimuth and six radial hydrostatic bearings, floated on oil for the first time this month at subcontractor Asturfeito’s facility in Spain. The system was pressurized …

21 July 2017: Ten billion years ago, a massive star ended its life in a brilliant explosion three times as bright as all of the stars in our galaxy, the Milky Way, combined. News of its death, which recently reached Earth, was detected in the Dark Energy Survey being carried out with DECam at the CTIO Blanco telescope (pictured, above right). The supernova is one of the most distant ever discovered and confirmed.