MagAO-X 2019B Unpacking Day 10: On The Correlation Between Viscachas and Windspeed

As Joseph reported yesterday, we couldn’t find any sign of our viscacha friends and we suspected it was due to the high winds and colder temperatures. Today I was able to gather more evidence. A correlation is seen between the local density of viscachas and the wind speed at their location. The following plot illustrates:

clear as day — A viscacha was present at the cleanroom when I arrived shortly after breakfast. Upon my departure for lunch, no viscachas were found. (times are UTC)

We establish a working threshold of 20 mph for vischacha absence. The nature of this transition is unknown.

It may be necessary to capture one for tests. But if they hold back the wind, this may be problematic. — The vischacha hoping for a calm day. The direction of causality between vischacha absence and high winds has yet to be established. Further study is needed.

It wasn’t all science today. We also fixed some calibration issues with our new setup in the LCO cleanroom. This took some remote help from our real-time software guru.

but it could be a simulation — Olivier Guyon waves to his grad students at Arizona.

Today’s song is “You Could Be Mine” by GNR.