A dedicated mission to investigate exoplanetary atmospheres represents a major milestone in our quest to understand our place in the universe by placing our Solar System in context and by addressing the suitability of planets for the presence of life. EChO—the Exoplanet Characterisation Observatory—is a mission concept specifically geared for this purpose. EChO will provide simultaneous, multi-...

The Sudbury Neutrino Observatory is a second-generation water Cherenkov detector designed to determine whether the currently observed solar neutrino de"cit is a result of neutrino oscillations. The detector is unique in its use of D 2 O as a detection medium, permitting it to make a solar model-independent test of the neutrino oscillation hypothesis by comparison of the chargedand neutral-curre...

Maintenance is an important activity in software engineering with studies attributing it more than 75% of the total cost of a system. More than half the time dedicated to maintenance is spent on reverse engineering the code which often is the only accurate source of information. In this context, among the many approaches, software visualization tools have long been seen as an important asset to...

We use an X-ray stacking technique to investigate the evolution of the mean X-ray luminosity of ∼21,000 red galaxies at 0.3 ≤ z < 0.9 as a function of their stellar mass and redshift. The red galaxies are selected from the 9.3 deg 2 Boötes field of the NOAO Deep Wide-Field Survey (NDWFS). The mean X-ray luminosity is an order of magnitude larger than we would expect from stellar sources alone a...

In 1965, researchers found that the direction formed by two stones from Stonehenge, a mysterious ancient structure, pointed exactly to the direction of sunrise at solstice. Several similar coincidences were discovered, which lead many people to believe that Stonehenge was an ancient observatory. In this paper, we analyze this problem from a geometric viewpoint and show that similar coincidences...

The island Tristan da Cunha is located in the South Atlantic Anomaly, and until recently the area has been one of the largest gaps in the global geomagnetic observatory network. As part of the Danish project SAADAN we set up a geomagnetic observatory on the island. Here we report on how we established the observatory in 2009 and on its operation in 2010.

Based on observations made with the Kitt Peak National Observatory 2.1m telescope, which is operated by National Optical Astronomy Observatories (NOAO) operated by AURA, Inc., under contract with the National Science Foundation and with the University of Hawaii 88 Inch telescope. Visiting Astronomer, University of Hawaii Observatory. Visiting Astronomer, Kitt Peak National Observatory, National...

bott, Dee Breger, and Lloyd Burckle Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, Columbia University, 61 Route 9W Palisades, NY 10964. [email protected] Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory. [email protected] Drexel University, 3141 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104 [email protected] Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, Columbia University 61 Route 9W Palisades, NY 10964 [email protected]...

We present high and moderate spectral resolution spectroscopy of diffuse ionized gas (DIG) emission in the halo of NGC 891. The data were obtained with the SparsePak integral field unit at the WIYN Observatory. The wavelength coverage includes the [N II]λλ 6548, 6583, Hα, and [S II]λλ 6716, 6731 emission lines. Position-velocity (PV) diagrams, constructed using spectra extracted from four Spars...

The methods and software interfaces used by ocean observatory operators and scientist users to access data generated by sensors and instruments attached to research observatories vary widely from facility to facility. The tools used to access instrument metadata and to control various instrument functions are also variable between observatories. An effort has begun in the US to define software ...