Flying out on Friday the 13th comes with some ominous portents. Thankfully, we only seemed to be hexed with suboptimal seat assignments and the briefest of turbulence. As of writing the early crew has made it safely to LCO, tucked in and ready to start fresh tomorrow morning.
Proof of life.
For all those traveling later, know that there are some tasty cafes right outside the B terminal now. Post security no longer contains the only sustenance offerings. The Starbucks by luggage check-in has, in fact, even kept up the important renaming ritual.
Jerry, Jen, and Iren – now caffeinated.
The welcoming committee to LCO was packed. Just as we turned off the highway a large wild horse heard greeted us. We ran into even more at the top of the mountain.
White horse in line.Sharing the road.Not sharing the road.
A family of Burros we’ve never seen before met us in the basin. One family was very bright white too! The more local mountain burros looked to have welcomed some new members recently as well.
Albino and family. Fluffball and family.
After a quick dinner (thank you chefs for staying open for us) Jay and I took a walk to double check we had our essentials in play. It looks like we’re all ready for tomorrow!
Cleanroom vizzy. MagAO-X in the cleanroom room.
The mythical white horse, the albino burro, and auspicious vizzy all must mean something. I’m sure we’ll be able to interpret these portents by the end of the run.
Color of the day: Prophetic Albino Burro White
Blog Rules: Color of the day
Every blog should include a color of the day. (Interpretative, but bonus points if a swatch of the color is included)
The color should be a reference to a blog occurrence or the song of the day
There shall be a song of the day, linked, with song title and artist in the description. (Sometimes the link dies, and the description helps us find it later.)
This is inspired by my love of dialed the color memorization game, and the fact you can color swatch your own photos.
Song of the Day:
You know, I just see horses and I know there’s a way.
PASADENA, CALIFORNIA – Every fewyears, an eclectic group of scientists and engineers gathers in a scenic location to discuss the minutiae that come with taking pictures of really dim things next to really bright things. The Spirit of Lyot conference is named for one Bernard Lyot, a French astronomer known for inventing an instrument to observe the Sun’s corona without having to wait around for a solar eclipse.
Early on in the conference, one of the organizers clarified that this gathering was about Lyot’s “spirit” meaning legacy, not his literal ghost. Now, we here at MagAO-X most certainly honor Lyot’s high-contrast legacy by observing binaries, disks, and planets. But, it’s also worth mentioning that if there’s one thing optical engineers are haunted by, it’s ghosts.
For those unfamiliar, a ghost is a technical term used in optics to describe an unwanted reflection. Put simply, this could be anything from seeing your own face reflected back at you when you’re trying to look out the window to having your laser bounce back off lenses it’s supposed to transmit through. Optical ghosts are pernicious little things; they can cause unwanted spots on your camera or even render your g-band filter practically useless. They’re difficult to get rid of, but pretty easy to introduce. So, in order to understand Dr. Bernard Lyot’s true opinion of MagAO-X’s contribution to his conference, I have taken it upon myself to summon his (optical) ghost this Friday the 13th and ask about his approval or disapproval on some things we did last week.
whether or not this is *technically* a ghost is up for debate, but I certainly consider seeing myself in my laptop screen as an “unwanted reflection”
APPROVED: A Plethora of Posters
From graduate students to postdocs, Lyot agrees we kept MagAO-X well-represented at both poster sessions throughout the week. In no particular order:
And this isn’t even all of them!
DISAPPROVED: Yassification
“Mais c’est quoi ça??”
-the spirit of Lyot, upon being shown the AI-yassified versions of our poster presentation photos
Out of respect for him (and Hayao Miyazaki), I will not include them here.
APPROVED: Talks on Talks on Talks
During the instrumentation sessions, we found ourselves well-represented. On Thursday, Jared talked about next-generation HCI with GMagAO-X, Laird got the chance to talk about WISPIT 2b, and Miles did some polarimetry show-and-tell about some disk observations. We also got to hear talks from Rico, Louis, and Adam, members of Sebastiaan’s group in Leiden, and Saraswathi, a postdoc from UASAL.
On Friday, Josh told us about the highs and lows of building the Self-Coherent Camera on the CACTI testbed, and Sebastiaan closed out the MagAO-X talks by giving an overview of the many, many emerging technologies in our field.
DISAPPROVED: Upside-down Glasses
A couple of us took the chance to tour NASA JPL, which got a seal of approval from both the four of us and the Spirit of Lyot. However, he (rightfully) poked fun at the picture of my failure to understand how 3D glasses work.
our girl voyagerooooh ahhhhJay’s kryptonite around every corner
APPROVED: Family Dinner
The conference dinner was held at Caltech’s Athenaeum. Not everyone could make it (places to be, e.g. Target), so we made sure to get a family photo beforehand.
say cheese!
DISAPPROVED: Etiquette Ignorance
I have no visual to illustrate this, but let’s just say Parker and I exchanged a very panicked glance when we saw the number of utensils we were expected to use at this dinner. Luckily we had a couple of former Navy Nukes to teach us the difference between a salad fork and a regular one.
APPROVED: Astro-tourism
If you believe his Wikipedia page, Lyot was also an avid mountaineer and even trekked to the Pic du Midi observatory when it was only accessible by cross-country ski. Naturally, his spirit approved of the group that stayed a little bit longer to make the journey up Mount Wilson.
c = 3×10^8 m/s
DISAPPROVED: A Seat-cushion Mishap
Ever wondered why, during the standard aircraft safety briefing, they tell you to ask for assistance if you lose an electronic device in your seat? Well, I no longer wonder that. Let’s just say the pilot himself came out to help at one point. The important part is that Josh and his earbud were reunited, safe and sound.
APPROVED: Song of the Day
In the spirit of Lyot: a French song that talks about both the Sun and finding something that exists, but was hiding:
Phil: Do you know what day it is? Rita: No, what? Phil: Today is tomorrow. It happened.
— Groundhog Day (1993)
This will be my 571st night at LCO (and this is my 270th blog post).
I feel like one always gets into a rhythm on a long observing run. It might take a while — with MagAO-X we always start with a frantic lab period, installing the latest crazy upgrades and tuning the instrument up. Then there’s “the day”, where we go 24 hours all at once to move up to the telescope. That helps with the transition, since you’re so tired after that you can’t help but sleep at 8 am. Then after about a week your body starts to adjust, and you can sleep a little later into the afternoon. One night turns into another, and you start to wonder if you’ve ever had a different day. But now we get to go find out what those different days are like.
Part of the crew departed this morning. The rest of us tomorrow.
MagAO-X works because of our great team. Thanks everybody for the hard work. And thanks to our great observers who bring us such interesting projects and challenging observations. See you next time.
As has become our normal practice, we have left MagAO-X set up for remote operations in the LCO cleanroom. This time it’s a little different, since we put it in the corner to keep the tent clear for another instrument. Fits just fine over there.
Of course we couldn’t just leave. There’s always something to work on.
We have exciting new things planned for next semester, so exciting we may have to change the way the blog works!
The bird-poop selfie is an ancient tradition, harkening back to the age of legends. The sky looks clear — but those clouds are closer than they appear.
Fun Fact: Imbolc is the old Gaelic name for what became Saint Bridget’s day, and is a seasonal festival marking the turning of Winter into Spring. The ancient goddess Brigid was welcomed into homes at Imbolc with hopes for a quick end to Winter and a warm Spring. Part of this festival included watching for animals to emerge, and to see if the hag Cailleach arranges for good weather so she can gather lots of firewood for the long remaining winter ahead. Does that sound familiar? Well, that just might be where modern Groundhog Day comes from.
And here’s a song about Bridget.
This is a good lullaby
This song has been on a MAPS run before. The artist, Celia Farran, was just in Tucson for the Celtic Festival — but we didn’t find out about it until it was too late.
We missed you! It’s been a whole MagAO-X observing run since we last saw you. We checked every day on our way up, but it seems like you were busy with other business.
Señor cleanroom Vizzy.
Last night, or morning? We had our last hurrah in the control room.
Everyone in the control room one last time.
Our take down crew went to bed early, but the night crew holdouts worked on Sebastiaan’s targets until the clouds told us it was time to pack up.
Clouds through the moonglow. “How am I expected to work in these conditions?”
The night crew’s responsible for shutting everything down, and tucking all the cables away before craning operations start. Though I’m sure you’ve heard us up to this before.
Face of a man about to take darks. The optimal position for deconstructing MagAO-X earthquake preparations
You might have seen quite a few cars swinging up and down the road to the cleanroom this morning. Josh and Parker were running up and down on errands before then we fully swapped with the day crew. I’m happy to report that both crews got a filling and balanced breakfast.
Rolling out the electronics rack.Unhooking the control room. An emptying NASE platform.
How did the day crew do? I heard they had some trouble with the bolt holes in the legs. Thank goodness the LCO crew is around to help when nuts get stuck. As you must have seen, MagAO-X is back in the clean room in good time. Some of us are sticking around one more day to attach all the sensitive parts and make sure it’s ready for remote observation.
Pondering above the fog. Evening walk to the small scopes.
I hope you’re staying warm with all these clouds coming through. We got one good walk in before they fully swallowed the mountaintop. The moisture in the air was just enough for us to finally smell the flowers. Also we finally had some free time to smell the flowers.
Geometry measurements of CLIO.All packed up for the trip to AZ.
Don’t forget to say hi to Manny! It’s been a while since the last time he was here but we promise he’s friendly. He just got here yesterday, but he’s already gotten so much of CLIO into a box.
The clouds finally covering the mountainside.
Sorry for all the noise by nap spot in the eves. I promise things will start to quiet down soon. Till next time,
Eden
P.S Song of the Day
Great No One by The Beths
P.P.S. Fun Fact.
Did you know that Seattle, USA has more cloudy days than London, UK?
Hi everyone! I’m Leah, a visiting observer from MIT. Tonight marks the last evening of observing for this run. After two successful previous nights of star-hopping for my targets (and some other observations), the operators began the day with a delicious breakfast (while I was fast asleep).
Today we were joined by Manny, the Technical Director for the Center for Astronomical Adaptive Optics, for the day. See an archival post from a previous trip of his here: https://xwcl.science/hardware/it-begins-clio-unpacking/
In our downtime, Elena and I have been testing the Merlin birdwatching app around the telescope domes and dorms. So far, we have found the Moustached Turca, the Greenish Yellow Finch, Black-winged Ground Doves, and the Mountain Caracara (and many other species we were unable to identify).
Mama vizzy courtesy of Miles
After dinner, the team made their way up the mountain, and partook in the usual viscacha-watching. Many of us gathered to watch the sunset, and took a group selfie (sans Parker and Josh).
Tonight’s science began with my observations where we are using a method called star hopping. For these observations, we jump back and forth from a star with a protoplanetary disc, to a similar star without a disc. We can then subtract the non-disc star from the disc star, which removes any unmasked starlight. This leaves us (hopefully) with a nice image of the dust in the disc.
It is imperative to switch between the two very quickly so as to not waste telescope time. Jared decided that part of his mission tonight was to optimise this process, so provided strict instructions for the operating team to work simultaneously to “reduce latency”. He brought out his phone stopwatch, and timed the operators, a responsibility taken over by Joseph later in the night. I am proud to say that all of our hops took less than one minute, reflecting the team’s dedication to optimising my observing time.
Despite the forecast originally being for thick clouds to roll in during the afternoon and stick around the whole night, we were very fortunate that the prophesied doom did not arrive. Aside from a few high altitude wispy clouds, our observations were unaffected. In fact, seeing improved greatly by the end of my time, leaving good seeing for Sebastiaan to finish the run.
I had a great time observing at LCO. The MagAO-X team was amazing to work with, and I have learned a lot about being an observational astronomer (one should make sure to have many backup targets!). Thank you to everyone for letting me join you here, and I hope to come back soon.
Song of the Day
A sunset conversation got me thinking back to my plants back home… accompanied by an impending feeling of doom.
Blonde Redhead – My Plants are Dead
Fun Fact of the Day
In the spirit of star hopping, I will educate you about a different type of hop. Hops (the plant) always grow in a clockwise spiral!
