:w Automated Astronomy Group

COE Observatory Report

2011


Tennessee State University
Center of Excellence in Information Systems
Nashville, Tennessee 37209

This report covers the interval January 1, 2011 through December 31, 2011.

The TSU Automated Astronomy Group within the TSU Center of Excellence in Information Systems concentrates on stellar astrophysics using photometric, spectroscopic, and astrometric techniques to study cool giants, chromospherically active stars, solar-type stars, planetary-candidate host stars, binary and multiple stars, and pulsating variables. Most of the data for these programs has been acquired with robotic telescopes and instrumentation developed in coordination with Lou Boyd at Fairborn Observatory in southern Arizona. Astronomy staff at the Center in 2011 were Geoffrey S. Burks, Michael R. Busby (Center Director), Francis C. Fekel, Gregory W. Henry, Matthew W. Muterspaugh, and Michael H. Williamson. Burks and Muterspaugh hold joint faculty appointments in the TSU Department of Mathematics and Physics. Askari Ghasempour and Samira Rajabi continued their work as Post-Doctoral Research Scientists. Samba Fall, Chelsea Harrison, Paul Klockenkemper, Julia O'Connell, and Christen Sergeyous, worked as student research assistants. O'Connell participated in the NSF-funded Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) at the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory (CTIO), graduated Magna cum Laude in Physics, and was accepted for graduate studies in astrophysics at Texas Christian University.

OBSERVING FACILITIES

Center of Excellence astronomers continue to operate several automatic telescopes at Fairborn Observatory in the Patagonia mountains of southern Arizona. Fairborn Observatory is a non-profit Educational Corporation directed by Lou Boyd and dedicated to the design, construction, and operation of automated telescopes. TSU telescopes include the T3 0.40 m automated photometric telescope (APT) for Johnson BV photometry, the T4 0.75 m APT for Stromgren by photometry, the T8, T10, T11, and T12 0.80 m APTs, also for Stromgren by photometry, and the T13 2.0 m automatic spectroscopic telescope (AST) for high-resolution echelle spectroscopy. The Celestron 14-inch (C14) automated imaging telescope (AIT) completed its first year of operation at Fairborn Observatory after two years of operation at Dyer Observatory in Nashville. This system was put together and automated by M. Williamson and enables CCD imaging of astronomical objects. It is used to achieve precision photometry of stars too faint for the APTs. The table below gives the number of years each telescope has been operational and the current observing program(s).
TSU Automatic Telescope Summaries
Telescope Type Years Primary Observing Program(s)
T2 0.25 m APT 19 Semi-Regular Variables (Decommissioned 2007)
T3 0.40 m APT 24 Chromospherically Active Stars, Planetary Candidate Stars
T4 0.75 m APT 19 Solar-type Stars
T8 0.80 m APT 16 Solar-type Stars
T10 0.80 m APT 12 Solar-type Stars, Planetary Candidate Stars
T11 0.80 m APT 12 Solar-type Stars, Planetary Candidate Stars
T12 0.80 m APT 12 Planetary Candidate Stars
T13 2.03 m AST 8 Binary and Multiple Stars, MOST Satellite Support, epsilon Aurigae
C14 0.36 m AIT 3 Extrasolar Planet Search, Public Outreach

Fekel and Muterspaugh continued their work on major upgrades to the performance of the 2m AST (funded by an NSF MRI grant) that included the commissioning of a new CCD detector for the primary echelle spectrograph. A new prototype compact yet high-resolution spectrograph was assembled at TSU and delivered to Fairborn for initial commissioning and should be completed in 2012. Better fiber optic couplers from the telescope to the spectroscopic instruments were also installed. The improved thoughput of the AST has resulted in increased signal-to-noise ratios for observations of brighter stars and the ability to obtain acceptable spectra of stars as faint as V = 10.5 mag. An in-hand glass secondary mirror was refigured to improve its shape and light focusing ability but had to be sent back to the optical company for additional reworking.

Fekel is nearing the end of his observing trips, which have spanned three decades, to Kitt Peak National Observatory to acquire spectroscopic observations for his radial velocity measurements. The upgraded TSU 2m telescope is now his primary source of spectra. Data from the two observatories have been combined with astrometric measurements or photometric light curves to determine the basic properties of stars. Work on eclipsing binaries with a new collaborator, C. Lacy (U. of Arkansas) is in progress and resulted in the publication of papers on HY Vir and BF Dra. Additional eclipsing binaries are being observed.

Muterspaugh, along with postdoc Ghasempour and students Fall, Harrison, and Sergeyous, also built a new camera for the Navy Precision Optical Interferometer (NPOI), located at Lowell Observatory near Flagstaff, Arizona. With this new instrument, NPOI will be able to create images of bright objects 200 times sharper than those produced by the Hubble Space Telescope. TSU, Navy, Lowell, and other collaborating astronomers will use this new capability to image surface features of other stars, study systems comprised of multiple stars, and bring better understanding to the mechanisms that cause some stars to pulsate.

OUTREACH

This year, we published the 2012 TSU Astronomy Research Group Calendar, the first in what is expected to be an annual project. Designed by TSU undergraduates, the calendar features highlights of recent results from the TSU Astronomy Research Group, including exoplanet research press releases, the observing facilities, new instrumentation efforts, and images from C14. The calendar was distributed to all TSU employees and to the general public through a partnership with Nashville's Adventure Science Center and Sudekum Planetarium. This first edition was received well by the public, demonstrating the local interest in learning more about basic research being done in the Nashville area.

2011 PUBLICATIONS

Desert, J.M., Sing, D., Vidal-Madjar, A., Hebrard, G., Ehrenreich, D., Lecavelier des Etangs, A., Parmentier, V., Ferlet, R., and Henry, G. W., "Transit Spectrophotometry of the Exoplanet HD 189733b. II. New Spitzer Observations at 3.6 microns," Astronomy & Astrophysics, 526, A12, 2011. (paper)

Erskine, D. J., Edelstein, J., Muirhead, P., Muterspaugh, M., Covey, K., Mondo, D., Vanderburg, A., Andelson, P., Kimber, D., Sirk, M., and Loyd, J., "Ten-Fold Spectral Resolution Boosting Using TEDI at the Mt. Palomar NIR Triplespec Spectrograph," in UV/Optical/IR Space Telescopes and Instruments: Innovative Technologies and Concepts V., SPIE Vol. 8146, eds. H. A. MacEwen & J. B. Breckinridge (SPIE: Bellingham, WA), p. 278, 2011. (paper)

Evans, N. R., Berdnikov, L., Gorynya, N., Rastorguev, A., and Eaton, J. A., "The Orbit of the Cepheid V350 Sgr Revisited," Astronomical Journal, 142, 87, 2011. (paper)

Fekel, F. C. "Three Decades of Coude Feed Observing," National Optical Astronomy Observatory Newsletter, No. 104, 41, 2011. (paper)

Fekel, F. C., Tomkin, J., Williamson, M. H., and Pourbaix, D., "New Precision Orbits of Bright Double-Lined Spectroscopic Binaries. VII. 47 Andromedae, 38 Cassiopeiae, and HR 8467," Astronomical Journal, 142, 69, 2011. (paper)

Fekel, F. C., Williamson, M. H., and Henry, G. W., "New Precision Orbits of Bright Double-Lined Spectroscopic Binaries. VI. HD 24623 and V923 Scorpii," Astronomical Journal, 141, 145, 2011. (paper)

Guinan, E. F., Engle, S. G., Prsa, A., Wasatonic, R. P., Fekel, F. C., Williamson, M., Matthews, J., Kolenberg, K., and Breger, M., "MOST Ultra-high Precision Photometry of delta Capricorni – the Nearest & Brightest Eclipsing Binary with a Pulsating Component: An Important Asteroseismic Laboratory for A-type Stars," Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, 43, No. 4, 407.16, 2011. (abstract)

Helminiak, K., Konacki, M., Muterspaugh, M. W., Browne, S. E., Howard, A. W., and Kulkarni, S. R., "Dynamical Evidence for a Sub-Stellar Companion to BY Draconis", American Astronomical Society, Extreme Solar Systems #2 Meeting Abstracts, #32.02, 2011. (abstract)

Henry, G. W., Fekel, F. C., and Henry, S. M., "A Volume-Limited Photometric Survey of 114 Gamma Doradus Candidates," Astronomical Journal, 142, 39, 2011. (paper)

Howard, A.W., Johnson, J.A., Marcy, G.W., Fischer, D.A., Wright, J.T., Henry, G.W., Isaacson, H., Valenti, J.A., Anderson, J., and Piskunov, N.E., "The NASA-UC Eta-Earth Program. II. A Planet Orbiting HD 156668 with a Minimum Mass of Four Earth Masses," Astrophysical Journal, 726, 73, 2011. (paper)

Howard, A.W., Johnson, J.A., Marcy, G.W., Fischer, D.A., Wright, J.T., Henry, G.W., Isaacson, H., Valenti, J.A., Anderson, J., and Piskunov, N.E., "The NASA-UC Eta-Earth Program. III. A Super_Earth Orbiting HD 97658 and a Neptune-Mass Planet Orbiting Gl 785," Astrophysical Journal, 730, 10, 2011. (paper)

Johnson, J. A., Clanton, C., Howard, A. W., Bowler, B. P., Henry, G. W., Marcy, G. W., Crepp, J. R., Endl, M., Cochran, W. D., MacQueen, P. J., Wright, J. T., and Isaacson, H., "Retired A Stars and their Companions. VII. 18 New Jovian Planets," Astrophysical Journal Supplement, 197, 26, 2011. (paper)

Johnson, J.A., Payne, M., Howard, A.W., Clubb, K.I., Ford, E.B., Bowler, B.P., Henry, G.W., Fischer, D.A., Marcy, G.W., Brewer, J.M., Schwab, C., Reffert, S., and Lowe, T.B., "Retired A Stars and Their Companions. VI. A Pair of Interacting Exoplanet Pairs Around the Subgiants 24 Sextanis and HD 200964," Astronomical Journal, 141, 16, 2011. (paper)

Kane, S. R., Ciardi, D., Dragomir, D., Fischer, D., Henry, G., Howard, A., Jensen, E., Laughlin, G., Mahadevan, S., Pilyavsky, G., von Braun, K., and Wright, J., "Improving Transit Predictions of Known Exoplanets with TERMS," Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, 43, No. 4, 128.03, 2011. (abstract)

Kane, S. R., Ciardi, D., Fischer, D., Gelino, D., Henry, G., Howard, A., Jensen, E., Laughlin, G., Mahadevan, S., Pilyavsky, G., von Braun, K., and Wright, J., "Transit Monitoring of Known Exoplanets with TERMS," Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, 43, No. 2, 220.03, 2011. (abstract)

Kane, S. R., Ciardi, D., Dragomir, D., Fischer, D., Henry, G., Howard, A., Jensen, E., Laughlin, G., Mahadevan, S., Pilyavsky, G., von Braun, K., Wang, X., and Wright, J., "The TERMS Project: Systematic Transit Exclusion," American Astronomical Society, Extreme Solar Systems #2 Meeting Abstracts, #19.15, 2011. (abstract)

Kane, S. R., Ciardi, D., Fischer, D., Henry, G., Howard, A., Jensen, E., Laughlin, G., Mahadevan, S., von Braun, K., and Wright, J., "Improving Transit Predictions of Known Exoplanets with TERMS," European Physical Journal (EPJ) Web of Conferences, 11, 06005, 2011. (paper)

Kane, S. R., Henry, G. W., Dragomir, D., Fischer, D. A., Howard, A. W., Wang, X, and Wright, J. T., "Revised Orbit and Transit Exclusion for HD 114762b," Astrophysical Journal, 735, L41, 2011. (paper)

Kane, S. R., Howard, A. W., Pilyavsky, G., Mahadevan, S., Henry, G. W., von Braun, K., Ciardi, D. R., Dragomir, D., Fischer, D. A., Jensen, E., Laughlin, G., Ramirez, S. V., and Wright, J. T., "Improved Orbital Parameters and Transit Monitoring for HD 156846b," Astrophysical Journal, 733, 28, 2011. (paper)

Knutson, H. A., Madhusudhan, N., Cowan, N. B., Christiansen, J. L., Agol, E., Deming, D., Desert, J.-M., Charbonneau, D., Henry, G. W., Homeier, D., Langton, J., Laughlin, G., and Seager, S., "A Spitzer Transmission Spectrum for the Exoplanet GJ 436b, Evidence for Stellar Variability, and Constraints on Dayside Flux Variations," Astrophysical Journal, 735, 27, 2011. (paper)

Lacy, C. H. S. and Fekel, F. C., "Absolute Properties of the Eclipsing Binary Star HY Virginis," Astronomical Journal, 142, 185, 2011. (paper)

Lehtinen, J., Jetsu, L., Hackman, T., Kajatkari, P., and Henry, G. W., "The Continuous Period Search Method and Its Application to the Young Solar Analogue HD 116956," Astronomy & Astrophysics, 527, A136, 2011. (paper)

Mikulášek, Z., Krtika, J., Henry, G. W., Janík, J., Zverko, J., Žižnovský, J., Zejda, M., Liška, J., Zveˇina, P., Kudrjavtsev, D. O., Romanyuk, I. I., Sokolov, N. A., Lüftinger, T., Trigilio, T., Neiner, C., and de Villiers, S. N., "Surprising Variations in the Rotation of the Chemically Peculiar Stars CU Virginis and V901 Orionis," Astonomy and Astrophysics, 534, L5, 2011. (paper)

Muirhead, P. S., Edelstein, J., Erskine, D. J., Wright, J. T., Muterspaugh, M. W., Covey, K. R., Wishnow, E. H., Hamren, K., Andelson, P., Kimber, D., Mercer, T., Halverson, S. P., Vanderburg, A., Mondo, D., Czeszumska, A., and Lloyd, J. P., "Precise Stellar Radial Velocities of an M Dwarf with a Michelson Interferometer and a Medium-Resolution, Near-Infrared Spectrograph," Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific, 123, 709, 2011. (paper)

Muterspaugh, M. W., Lane, B. F., Konacki, M., Burke, B. F., Colavita, M. M., Shao, M., Hartkopf, W. I., Boss, A. P., O'Connell, J., Fekel, F. C., Wiktorowicz, S. J., "The Planet in the HR 7162 Binary System Discovered by PHASES Astrometry," Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, 43, No. 2, 429.09, 2011. (abstract)

O'Connell, J. E., Johnson, C. I., Pilachowski, C. A., and Burks, G., "Chemical Abundances of Red Giant Stars in the Globular Cluster M107 (NGC 6171)," Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific, 123, 1139, 2011. (paper)

Parks, J. R., White, R. J., Schaefer, G. H., Monnier, J. D., and Henry, G. W., "Starspot Imaging with the CHARA Array," in Proceedings of the 16th Cambridge Workshop on Cool Stars, Stellar Systems, and the Sun, ASP Conf. Ser. 448, eds. C. M. Johns-Krull, M. K. Browning, and A. A. West (San Francisco: ASP), p. E-1217, 2011. (paper)

Pilyavsky, G., Mahadevan, S., Kane, S. R., Howard, A. W., Ciardi, D. R., de Pree, C., Dragomir, D., Fischer, D., Henry, G. W., Jensen, E. L. N., Laughlin, G., Marlowe, H., Rabus, M., von Braun, K., Wright, J. T, and Wang, X. X., "A Search for the Transit of HD 168443b: Improved Orbital Parameters and Photometry," Astrophysical Journal, 743, 162, 2011. (paper)

Ratajczak, M., Konacki, M., Kulkarni, S. R., and Muterspaugh, M. W., "A Keck I/HIRES and TNG/SARG Radial Velocity Survey of Speckle Binary Stars," American Astronomical Society, Extreme Solar Systems #2 Meeting Abstracts, #20.03, 2011. (abstract)

Roettenbacher, R. M., Harmon, R. O., Vutisalchavakul, N., and Henry, G. W., "A Study of Differential Rotation on II Pegasi via Photometric Starspot Imaging," Astronomical Journal, 141, 138, 2011. (paper)

Sing, D. K., Pont, F., Aigrain, S., Charbonneau, D., Desert, J.-M., Gibson, N., Gilliland, R., Hayek, W., Henry, G., Knutson, H., Lecavelier des Etangs, A., Mazeh, T., and Shoperer, A., "Hubble Space Telescope Transmission Spectroscopy of the Exoplanet HD 189733b: High-Altitude Atmospheric Haze in the Optical and Near-Ultraviolet with STIS," Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 416, 1443, 2011. (paper)

Wright, N. J., Drake, J. J., Mamajek, E. E., and Henry, G. W., "The Stellar-Activity-Rotation Relationship and the Evolution of Stellar Dynamos," Astrophysical Journal, 743, 48, 2011. (paper)