Home of MagAO and MagAO-X.
When my friend and I are bored or need cheering we up, we send each other Star Wars prequel memes. As you can imagine during ‘these uncertain times’ we have been sending each other a lot of them. Here are some of my favorite ones so far.
Starting with the obligatory coronavirus themed ones:
And now some random ones.
If you don’t think the scene where Anakin kills the younglings is funny maybe don’t read these.
Song of the day: Also a Star Wars Prequel Meme.
After 29 days of the Stay At Home, I had an appointment. I had a thing to do, at a time, in a place other than my house, with another person.
The University of Arizona and the State have come together to ramp up COVID-19 antibody testing, beginning with 3000 healthcare workers, 500 University students, and 1000 unaffiliated Pima county residents. One of the other graduate students shared the sign-up link in Slack, and half of our team of grad students signed up.
(In fact, a surprising number of the other astronomy graduate students said they were signed up. My theory is that, with all the undergrads gone, the only people in the “University student” category both bored enough to read all University communiques and geographically close enough to participate are the grad students.)
This is a blood test for COVID-19 antibodies, which tells you if you were recently infected and recovered. (Not the same thing as the “are you currently infected?” test, which uses a nasopharyngeal swab.) I don’t think I was infected, although apparently many cases are entirely asymptomatic. I just wanted something to do, with the added bonus of helping the study ramp up their process.
So, today at 9:40 AM I arrived at the Health Sciences building. The appointment slots on the sign up sheet were in 10 minute intervals, which I thought was a polite fiction. (I always choose early appointments because medical scheduling rivals JWST for delays.)
Incredibly, I was out by 9:47 AM. Let me walk you through the process.
It’s funny that we’re in a situation where you really don’t want to get COVID-19, but really do want to have already had COVID-19.
My friend pointed out that phlebotomy is a good cover job for a vampire. Tangentially related, today’s song of the day is “Blood Like Lemonade” by Morcheeba.
In the days of MagAO-Classic, I would write daily blog posts 3-5 times per week. By the time we got to Day 29 in the run I would be so exhausted I was grateful for anyone to write blog posts. Now the tables have turned and here I am, belatedly showing up on the blog after a month on the mountain at home!
OK so what have I actually been working on? Well, the above picture is actually relevant.
Adaptive Optics (AO) for Exoplanets can be done in various different ways. One difference is the type of Deformable Mirror (DM) you use to control the wavefront. You can use an Adaptive Secondary Mirror (ASM) for better sensitivity to planets that are brighter in infrared (heat) wavelengths. Or you can use a Micro-Electro-Mechanical Systems (MEMS) for better sensitivity to planets that are reflecting the light of their stars (like our Moon reflects our Sun).
MagAO-Classic uses an ASM, and while it has been successful with both infrared planets with Clio and visible-light planets with VisAO, its sensitivity was limited in the visible. Therefore MagAO-eXtreme uses a MEMS, for more precise wavefront control that allows for better sensitivity to reflected-light planets.
I have worked with both MEMS and ASM DMs. In ancient times (pre-Classical) I characterized many iterations of MEMS DMs for the Gemini Planet Imager (GPI), including holding the positions and monitoring what they do over time:
MagAO-X has a similar but more modern MEMS, and my expertise has come in handy. Now in the post-classical world I’m PI of the “MAPS” instrument (MMT AO exoPlanet characterization System). MAPS is using an ASM that we are building ourselves at Arizona. We are in the lab-testing phase and Amali Vaz (click to read her award-winning blog posts) is running similar tests of actuator stability on the MAPS ASM:
The MAPS ASM project was initially led by the original MagAO-C/Clio PI, Phil Hinz. He has moved to a new job to lead the Laboratory for Adaptive Optics (where the above MEMS work was done) and I am now PI of both MAPS and Clio. So this project has been a way back into DM and actuator characterization. Let’s look at some more pictures.
The song of the day is a Classic (that can be pushed to the eXtreme) that I first learned in high school band, Malagueña. I present a study of some of my favorite versions. First the Drum & Bugle Core version, representing ancient history:
Then the classical guitar version, a Classic:
Finally, a special treat, Fuego Malagueña by Esteban featuring Teresa Joy, is the eXtreme version:
I report to you live from my bed, where I have spent a lot of time the last six weeks or so, sleeping, (…sometimes…) working, and playing video games.
[taps my metaphorical microphone] …hello…? Hello! I’m Erin Maier, your guest stay-at-home blogger for this fine Wednesday. I’m a PhD student in astronomy working with Dr. Ewan Douglas in the University of Arizona Space Astrophysics Lab group (UASAL) on various things related to high contrast imaging from space (including continuing the good work of Dr. Kelsey Miller on Electric Field Conjugation.) I report to you live from my bed, where I have spent a lot of time the last six weeks or so, sleeping, (…sometimes…) working, and playing video games.
Video games have become my biggest social outlets in these times of quarantine, and I know they have for other people too. Every day I get closer to buying a Nintendo Switch so I can play Animal Crossing with all my friends. Alas, I’m not quite there yet. The turnip market scares me. As does Tarantula Island. But I’ve picked up Overwatch for the first time in two years or so to play with my best friend; a friend bought me and another friend copies of a JRPG called Octopath Traveler and we’ve been livestreaming with each other on the weekends (we also have a cooperative Stardew Valley farm between the 3 of us); another friend and I have little dates in Destiny 2 every Tuesday evening to do a challenge that’s on a 6 week rotation and grab the special collectibles together. This is what our “we still on for this evening?” conversations have become:
Of all my games, I’ve been spending the most time in Destiny 2, and it’s been a major help in keeping my mental health up, mostly by being an escape fantasy. I mean, sure, the Universe is once again under threat by the powers of Darkness that nearly destroyed us a couple centuries ago, but that’s something I personally can do something about, unlike this pandemic. It’s an open world looter-shooter with plenty to do at all levels of commitment. It’s easy to spend a couple hours exploring and doing bounties on my own,
or hop into the Crucible (6 player – vs 6 player battle royale mode) on my own or with friend(s) for a few matches,
or throw up a “looking for game” post to preplan an activity if I want to do something mechanically difficult to take my mind off things. There’s a group of us slowly working through the list of achievements required to get the special title “Rivensbane” for Last Wish, my favorite raid in the game. We run it a couple of time a week together, and cheer on each others’ successes and commiserate the failures.
My fellow UASAL grad student in OpSci, Jaren Ashcraft, has also recently picked up Destiny 2! Which has been exciting! We yell about optics, take a break to go shoot some aliens, go back to yelling about optics. It’s been fun dragging him all over the Solar System and being like “oh god is this what my friends felt like when I was a new player?” I feel a deep sense of responsibility to make sure he gets to see all of the cool places and things and also to laugh when he misjudges his jumps and falls off a cliff (karma usually gets me a few minutes later).
He’s also still leveling his character, which means he’s often stuck with the ugly low rarity gear. I try very hard not to be mean about it because I was there once, but also, I can’t believe there was a time I thought this stuff was fashionable.
You know what, this seems like a perfect time to do a reenactment of the Old Spice “Look at your man” skit.
Hello, Guardians.
Look at your Guardian.
Now back to me.
Now back at your Guardian.
Now back to me.
Sadly, they aren’t me. But if they keep grinding, and find some decent gear, they could, someday, have a power level like me! Look down.
Back up. Where are you?
You’re on the Moon, with the Guardian your Guardian COULD be! What’s in your hand?
Back at me.
I have it. It’s the materials you need to upgrade your gear.
Look again.
The materials are now pigeons. Aren’t they adorable?
Anything is possible when you work hard, Guardians.
I’m on a tiny sparrow.
(I spent like half an hour in game yesterday taking all these screenshots. Many thanks to Nan for their help with my shenanigans.)
If you’re looking for another game to play during this quarantine and enjoy shooters, I recommend Destiny 2! The base game and first 2 expansions are free. If I finally break down and get a Switch and Animal Crossing, I’ll let you all know…MagAO-X’s own Lauren Schatz has recommended the game Astroneer though, so I might pick that up first.
Stay safe and healthy, my dear readers. Take some time for yourselves when you need it.
– Erin
Oh, I almost forgot – your song of the day! The “Escape” version of “Shell of What Was” from the Last Wish raid in Destiny 2. Great motivation music. Plays while you’re running a combination relay race/high stakes hot potato with the heart of a dragon.
One of the best features in Tucson, in my opinion, is The Loop, a 70+ mile paved bike and pedestrian paths that encircles the city, mostly on the shoulders of a dry wash. I live pretty close to the Loop on the westside of town, and to keep active and get out of the house, I’ve been walking, running, or biking on the loop nearly every day for weeks now. My office is situated such that at ~4:30 the afternoon sun makes it impossible to sit there anymore, and I guess I have to stop working now, oh darn. So I’ve been heading to the same portion of the Loop at about the same time at least 3-4 times a week to walk or run. Thus I’ve developed “Loop friends” – I see the same people nearly every time who are also in the same routine. There’s the lady with the fat dog (she will smile at me), and the one guy who runs back and forth on the same ~0.5 mile stretch, so he passes me several times as I’m walking (he does not smile at me). There’s that ~12 year old kid on the skateboard who held his hand out to me for a high five one time like a psycho (don’t you know there’s a virus on??), and those two homeless guys always in the same spot by the cool tree.
Some other Loop friends:
We all know that the nation-wide shutdown has caused many people temporary or permanent loss of income. There are calls online for rent and mortgage payment requirements to be temporarily restricted, since so many people everywhere will find it very hard to make those payments at the moment. Unsurprisingly, this has not yet happened. But #RentStrike has sure taken hold online. So for today’s blog entry, I present to you a gallery of #RentStrike related art to be found on the Loop’s west side.
Say what you will about the quality, the artist’s message was clear and consistent throughout their body of work.
And then, one day, it was all gone. Just like that.
Although the bridge underside doesn’t appear to be any cleaner than it was before. So maybe the paint was magicked away? Who cared so much to paint “Rent Strike” all over everything on this one section of the Loop? And then who swooped in to clean it all off without managing to also clean the bridge underpass wall it was on? The Loop keeps her secrets.
Song of the day is “Rent” from the broadway show “Rent”. Some particularly apt lyrics from this song for the current global climate and today’s topic.