Author: Jialin Li

MagAO-X 2023A Day 14: A “Typical” Night at LCO

Clay with dome opened captured by Jared

Day 14 of this observing run marked my first full night and the first full MaxProtoPlanetS night. Despite having a few bumps, it was overall a 0.5″ seeing kind of night! This allowed us to take great data on a target without ADC tracking and driving the telescope to below 30 degrees, which I believe is the first in MagAO-X history.

I still can’t believe this is considered a typical night…
With the telescope pointing so low, Clay’s primary mirror can be really well seen from the dome floor

There were lots of interesting conversations going on in the control room. Jared shared a sailor story beginning with the mandatory opening phrase of “so, there I was”, slightly interrupting the “Would you rather” game that was happening among the junior graduate students. Here are a few prompts that I overheard thought were interesting:

  • No elbows or knees
  • Cold spaghetti or the smell of cold spaghetti
  • Receding or preceding hairline

When doing the customary “blinking” technique to see the small differences between two wavelengths in the data, the exoplanet imaginers and instrument builders in the control room turned into a group of paleontologists amazed by the recovery of a dinosaur skull.

“I might have been staring at this for too long… but it looks a lot like a dinosaur to me”

Happy International Women’s Day!

Selfie from the strong, independent, and intelligent gals on the mountains 😉

As a celebration of International Women’s Day, the chefs surprised us with a decadent chocolate cake for dinner. A big shout-out to all the women (and girls) of the MagAO-X team, guest observers, and telescope operators!

Special treat for their “favorites” prepared by the chefs.
“Dessert for MEN,” said Joseph, as he enjoyed his second plate of mashed potatoes.

Song of the Day

Song of the Day was a tough choice as there were so many great songs that are great representations of female empowerment. I have chosen the one that is considered one of the “fiercest female anthems” in the 2010s. Now comes the awkward part of me attempting to explain how I came to know this song. Truth be told, I do not recall when, where, how, and why. Whenever I think about the celebration of female strength and beauty, this first song pops up in my head.

One of the earliest memory I associate this song with is my schoolyard with the radio often blasting the hit songs. So I guess I know this song from the radio?

MagAO-X 2022B Day 12: Wait, we’re already doing science?

After an eventful 24 hour day, a record might have been broken at the Las Campanas Observatory; we have welcome 3 more University of Arizona scientists, making a total of 12 Arizonians on the Chilean mountains.

Clay telescope with opened dome

Second night on sky began with the customary group sunset viewing photo taken by UA Professor Xiaohui Fan.

“I don’t always drink. But when I do, it’s 2 Fantas and a hot tea.”

With Avalon’s efforts, 10 low order wavefront sensing modes were closed on sky for the first time! “10 might not seem like a lot, but don’t most close on 2?”

Avalon and Jared working together on closing the loop.

Science targets were observed while working towards engineering goals throughout the night. Sebatiaan captured beautiful images of R Aqr. If you’d like to see them, like, comment, and subscribe to this blog to hear the newest updates. Warren continued on PIAA alignment and tested it on a binary, possibly multiple star system, HD 20121.

One’s looking happy because of closed loop and the other because of science.

PDS 201 is the first target observed for the Max Protoplanet Survey on this run. With the great seeing around 0.4, the 3 hour observation through its transit resulted in the total of about 80K high quality images. This also means a grad student will be reducing data happily throughout the next day. And the night ended with some more effort in engineering, characterizing vibration and making Strehl measurements.

Aligning the pupils to observe PDS 201

While in the kid’s lounge… some might say they are having too much fun.

Apple pencil Mystery/Saga: “It’s like looking for your glasses when they are on your face.”
“Joseph looks like a puppy about to be kicked in the face.”
“That’s what tech support does to you.”
There’s always a new way to wear MagAO-X swag!

Since we went on a journey yesterday, let’s go on a getaway today!

MagAO-X 2022B Day 7: First Team Photo Captured!

First post from Jialin, a new astronomy grad of the MagAO team! As a part of the Gen-Z crew that arrived yesterday, I spent today in my “bubble” keeping myself busy with work and olive counting while waiting for the arrival of MagAO-X. We should be freed tomorrow at 10am after our final COVID test. Shout out here to Joseph for coffee delivery to everyone in the “bubble” and Sebastiaan for his generous donation of the spare coffee machine.

The number of olives served today was surpringly low, merely 10.

To balance the calories consumed and burned, Avalon, Eden, and I went for a scenic walk to the 100-inch after lunch. We spotted the first guanacos since our arrival and managed to capture them with just “5 pixels”.

MagAO tradition of excrement-covered mirror selfies!
Spot the guanaco(s)?
Putting some pretty flowers seen on the walk so not all photos are selfies.

With full attendance (of those who are physically here at LCO), we went for an expedition attempting to spot the green flash at the robotic telescopes. We witnessed the sunset as well as the opening of the HATPI telescope (video below), which can detect a variety of different objects, from near-earth asteroids and exoplanets around bright stars to novae and bright gamma-ray bursts.

Group viewing of the HATPI telescope after it opened.
Warning sign outside the robotic telescope.
Robotic telescope cover opening

With the help of Joseph’s tripod, here is the first 8-person team photo of this run! We are all smiling 🙂

YAY TEAM!

Song of the Day

Non-mandatory explanation of my choice of song: first recommendation from Youtube after listening to yesterday’s song of the day!