Every MagAO-X morning begins with a hearty breakfast.
Jialin and Logan enjoying their pigs in a duvet. Jialin constructs a finderscope.
Jay constructs a breakfast hot dog.
Sebastiaan makes an interesting face.
Following a scrumptious meal and a full night of observing, I entered hibernation.
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Zzzzzzzzzzzz
While I was in my state of low activity, the other group members observed a wild horse and some Vizzies.
“If I were meant to be controlled, I would have come with a remote.” ~ A common wild horse quote
A high pixel count Viz.
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ZZZzzzzZZZ
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I emerged from a long day’s slumber just in time for dinner. Unfortunately there were no food action shots this time.
Eden had an opportunity to experience the LCO flora and fauna before heading back up to the telescope.
The culprit.
A PSA from the desk of Eden ‘Sparkles’ McEwen: Cacti do not make a good chair substitute.
Tonight’s observing run got off to a bit of a dramatic start when the operator discovered a strong amount of coma on the telescope. Although I forgot to collect photographic evidence of the events that immediately followed, I constructed an artistic depiction for everyone’s benefit.
Trouble at the telescope!
After we recovered from the early evening drama, the night progressed very smoothly. In fact, things were going so well that Jared began regaling some MagAO-Xers with tales from his seafaring youth.
“When I was a young warthog…”
And then…a happy accident occurred! Twins!!!!!
We discovered two companions within this image. Can you spot them? Hint: Look to the upper left.
To close out this fine day (or evening…I have lost all sense of time), I have included a song by my high school band (per Jialin’s request) that I feel is aptly named.
We finally had an all-night good night. Started with what we call engineering, which means testing new ways of operating the instrument. The big news is that Sebastiaan got his “implicit Electric Field Conjugation” algorithm to work on-sky. This brings MagAO-X almost to its as-planned fully capability. Here’s what that looks like to one of our highly trained operators:
A fully armed and operational MagAO-X station.
Why would one want to conjugate an electric field? Let’s let Sebastiaan explain:
Speckles are why twinkling is bad for science
After the instrument-science experiments, we spent the rest of the night hunting planets. Tonight was almost one of those legendary Cerro Manqui nights that keeps us coming back over and over again. It was essentially 0.5″ seeing all night, but we were plagued by our version of the low-wind effect. However instead of Mickey Mouse, we get the Bouncey House: when the wind drops to 0.0 the telescope gets bored and starts to bounce. It makes our control loop more or less impossible to optimize.
If you’ve been around this blog a time or two you’ve probably heard our woes with respect to seeing — the measurement of just how twinkly the stars are. Twinkling is bad for science, and our instrument can’t operate well if the seeing is too high.
We started this run with some pretty good seeing! In fact, two nights ago was the first night for my program and the seeing was excellent! I was able to observe a lot of my targets and get great images. You might have seen that last night was less spectacular, and I’m sad to see tonight is no different.
Off the charts seeingThat’s 2.5 arcsec seeing, wind gusts of 35.
Before we closed for wind and more engineering, Jialin got to drive some and I took some maybe-useable data.
Driver’s ed
Some animals and nice shots from the day.
Some of Eden’s lovely telescope night shots
BUT WAIT! The night’s not over yet. Immediately after my time was up and I left the control room, seeing tanked just in time for Jay’s disk observations
Ooh a dark holeJosh and Jared drive the coronagraphJay getting data
The night ended strong with Jay riding out his target until sunrise.
Moon setJoseph’s sky pic
Some of you may have clocked that I arrived a bit late to the mountain this time. Well here is the quick story time.
In May last year I had a foot surgery that through many ups and downs has still not fully healed today (that’s a story for another time). I haven’t been able to bear weight on my left foot since May, approximately 10 months of not using my foot. About three weeks ago I got the go ahead to start walking on it again, and I was slowly and carefully transitioning back to bearing weight. But even though I was mostly walking, I couldn’t walk long distances, so I decided to bring my knee scooter to get around the airports easily.
In Santiago customs I got selected for an extra security scan and as I was hauling my luggage around I lost balance and fell over the front of the scooter, which severely messed up my left first metatarsil bone (the main bone through your foot leading to each toe). I couldn’t put any weight even on my heel or move or touch or even put my croc shoe on my foot. So I decided to stay in La Serena and see a doctor to be sure it wasn’t broken. It wasn’t. But the long period of disuse makes it incredibly lucky that it wasn’t! I saw the dr again a few days later, then headed up on Thursday.
I’m doing a lot better now! Still not walking, I’ve got crutches now to get around the site. But definitely better. At this trajectory I might be able to walk some by the time we leave.
So that’s the story!
The song of the day is The Calamity Song by The Decemberists
The day-to-day operation of an experimental extreme adaptive optics instrument, pushing all the boundaries at once, can feel like lurching from crisis to crisis. We need to get better airflow in the bowels of our electronics rack. We need to automate the fifty-three step alignment process. We need to debug this segmentation fault in our control software. We desperately need to do laundry, but we’re unwilling to sacrifice sleep or work time.
Today, a portentous wind blew all through dinner. Jialin and Laird got on right at sunset, and it looked for a minute like we’d have an okay night. Windy.com predicted calm conditions. In fact, it’s continuing to predict calm conditions.
However:
Yes, the wind line is going into the humidity plot.
We have to close the telescope for average wind speeds of 35 mph, and it’s gusting to 52 mph. Jialin is no longer allowed outside without a tether in case she blows away.
Some days you feel mega and some days not so mega.Say it ain’t so!
We tried to open the door to the outdoors but nature said “no. ❤️”
The conditions at Las Campanas will blow you away.
At times like these, the hard-working AOistas thank Mother Nature for delivering exceptionally bad conditions so that we can focus on what’s important: software development, esprit de corps, and blog #content.
We did take some data before we got shut down, though. And, who knows, maybe this will all just blow over. Meanwhile, Jared was not satisfied with the amount of wind and went to get some extra fans for our instrument. Armed with a couple of graduate students, he went to hunt in the storage building between telescopes.
Inside a box cryptically labeled VisAO (possibly some viscacha-themed instrument?) were some fans for cannibalization. This will hopefully help us even out temperatures in the electronics rack.
“Hello old friend”— Jared
2024-04-24 00:00 CLST
Sparkles “Eden” McEwen turned 25 today! We only use UTC for consistency in our instrument, but birthdays are celebrated in local time.
We’re happy you were born!
2024-04-24 01:27 CLST
Wind’s dying down! Finally!
Jared took some data down at the lodge while he was checking on his laundry. Seems like he got a bit of sky rotation.
If you visit the southern hemisphere you can see the Magellanic Telescopes, discovered by astronomers in 2001.
Tomorrow’s a half-night for me, so I’m taking advantage of my last full night to file my second and final blog post for 2024Aa. Until next time, enjoy some hair-metal revival from STARBENDERS.
Song of the Day
We can face the darkness, baby. It’s all in the way you play the game.
“The Game” by STARBENDERS
#content
I know we’re not the first ones to use AI image generation, but its ability to capture South American animals has greatly improved since I last tried it out.
O B E Y (prompted by Sebastiaan)The tail-less giant mountain viscacha has not been seen since the last ice age.The ELBT (Extremely Large Banana Telescope) (prompted by Jay)
Clay and the moon, aka the massless particle in a RTBP, at sunset.
It’s the first double digit day of the 2024Aa run! As the master scheduler, tonight’s time is finely chopped up into four different blocks. Let’s hear what the MagAO-X scientists are doing for the night, and maybe ask them some fun questions. Ok, maybe they are just questions randomly popped into the minds of the deliriously tired interviewer and scientists.
Before we go to the main event, here are some animal spotting! Can you spot the 4 different viscachas and the guanaco?
iEFC on Sky Commission with Josh Liberman
What is iEFC and why is it so important?
Josh: iEFC is implicit electric field conjugation, a technique for removing quasi-static speckle and it allows us to reach higher contrast.
How did commissioning go?
Josh: We drove up at 3pm and performed calibrations. Everything went well, and we opted to skip dinner to finish calibration before sunset. The telescope dome opened after sunset viewing. When we returned to the control room, MagAO-X was in a state of extreme distress: the DM got really angry and the system was misaligned. Everything that could go wrong went wrong.
What were the immediate thoughts that went through your head when the system misaligned after dome opening?
Sebastiaan: God Damn it!
Josh recreating the recreaction of SebastiaanSebastiaan recreation of himself
If you can befriend a fictional character who would it be?
Josh: Flat Stanley, he just gives off good vibes you know?
What is an insignificant petty gripe that makes you extremely angry?
Josh: When someone replies all to a group email.
YSES Survey Follow Up Observations with Sebatiaan Haffert
What is the YSES Survey and what observations are you doing?
Sebastiaan: YSES stands for the young suns exoplanet survey. I am doing a follow up of systems with confirmed companion. So far, 2/3 of my targets are successful.
Look at this binary!
How is it like being both an engineer and an observer?
Sebastiaan: I am not an engineer.
Logan: But you built an instrument!
On a scale of 1 to 10, where 10 is the most tired, please rate how tired you are after working from 3pm to 6am?
Sebastiaan: A three, it kind of feels like dinner time.
Flying or invisibility?
Sebastiaan: How important is invisibility if you have to be naked?
If you were to be a traffic sign, what would it be?
Sebastiaan: The “Watch Out” sign with the deer on it.
If you could make an office rule that everyone had to follow for a day, what would it be?
Sebastiaan: Everyone should walk backwards
What is an insignificant petty gripe that makes you extremely angry?
Sebastiaan: When the toilet paper roll is put in backwards!
Pup Search Observations with Logan Pearce
What is the backstory of the name of the survey?
Logan: the first White Dwarf-Main Sequence binary ever “made” was Sirius A and B. Sirius A, the main sequence star was known as the dog star. So Sirius B, the smaller companion was nicked name the pup. Now I am looking for more pups!
Logan and her new discovered pup!
Pup Search and Xoomies (Logan’s project on fetching companions to accelerating stars in Scorpius Centaurus Star Forming Region with MagAO-X) are all related to dogs, will your next project named similarly?
Logan: Man, it takes so much time to come up with names. We (Sebastiaan and I) spent all of the astrobiology conference coming up with the Xoomies names.
Sebastiaan: Mine will be about a stroop waffle. I don’t know what it will be about, but I already have the logo made.
Flying or invisibility?
Logan: Hands down flying! I don’t get those who chooses invisibility…
If you were to be a traffic sign, what would it be?
Logan: Parking signs with a bunch of confusing texts.
What is an insignificant petty gripe that makes you extremely angry?
Logan: Double doors with one side locked. WHY DON’T THEY UNLOCK BOTH DOORS?????
Debris Disk Imaging with Jaylycia Kuenberger
What kind of objects are you observing tonight and what are you trying to get out of your observations?
Jaylycia: I am observing circumstellar disks, which are rings of dusty materials encircling its host star. I look at disks at all stages of extrasolar system formation. But this particular target tonight is a debris disk and I am just trying to get an image of the disk to characterize it.
Disks are generally thought to be difficult, what are your thought about that?
Jaylycia: Yes, they are more difficult than point sources, but they look cooler! They are very faint and they are easily removed during image processing, by accident.
How does it feel to be an AO operator and an observer at the same time?
Jaylycia: I don’t.
Who came up with your new name?
Jaylycia: Maggie-OX did. It’s the best thing that’s happened to me.
If you were to be a traffic sign, what would it be?
Jaylycia: NO PARKING! I DoN’T KnOw!
As a former pastry chef, which dessert do you think best describes you?
Jaylycia: A hefty cream puff with vanilla custard filling.
Song of the Day
Hmmm… What would be a more fitting music than the BBC News Intro music for an interview?
Well, thanks for tuning into the special program of today!
