Cosmic Chatter Seminar
Cosmic Pathfinders is a student-focused program of online events and in-person gatherings that provides an interface to NASA astrophysics. It is motivated by an immediate need to develop the next generation of the STEM workforce in space-related fields. The program includes an ongoing series of virtual colloquia, called Cosmic Chatter, that addresses astrophysics research and professional development topics.
Location
Virtual
Dates
30 May 2024
Community
Cosmic Pathfinders
Type
Seminar
Modeling Asteroids and Using Microwave Telescope Data to Constrain Thermophysical Properties
Speaker
Mariah Jones (Vassar College)
Abstract
The South Pole Telescope (SPT), a millimeter-wave bolometer camera designed to measure the polarization of light left over from the early universe, happens to observe asteroids during its detection of the cosmic microwave background. Due to the long exposure of asteroids resulting from this detection method, the telescope can image multiple stages of the asteroids’ path. With access to these images, we want to determine whether this data is useful in constraining thermophysical properties of asteroids. We write an interface capable of loading in and modeling an asteroid shape model, which then determines the temperature distribution concerning the depth of the asteroid and uses this information to calculate the object’s flux. We then compare our modeled flux outputs to measured data from microwave telescopes to check the accuracy of our interface, and then determine a thermophysical property of (2) Pallas. Based on our plots of the measured flux divided by the modeled flux, we conclude that SPT data is very beneficial in constraining these properties. Furthermore, we gather that this asteroid has a higher thermal inertial value, correlating to increased thermal conductivity, density, and specific heat capacity of materials comprising (2) Pallas.
Session Video
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