NASA Hubble Space Telescope Daily Status Report #4201

HUBBLE SPACE TELESCOPE DAILY REPORT # 4201 – Continuing to collect World Class Science

PERIOD COVERED: UT September 18, 2006 (DOY 261)

OBSERVATIONS SCHEDULED

ACS/HRC 10738

Earth Flats

Sky flats will be obtained by observing the bright Earth with the HRC and WFC. These observations will be used to verify the accuracy of the flats currently in the pipeline and to monitor any changes. Weekly coronagraphic monitoring is required to assess the changing position of the spots.

ACS/HRC/WFC 10758

ACS CCDs daily monitor

This program consists of a set of basic tests to monitor, the read noise, the development of hot pixels and test for any source of noise in ACS CCD detectors. The files, biases and dark will be used to create reference files for science calibration. This programme will be for the entire lifetime of ACS. Changes from cycle 13:- The default gain for WFC is 2 e-/DN. As before bias frames will be collected for both gain 1 and gain 2. Dark frames are acquired using the default gain {2}. This program cover the period May, 31 2006- Oct, 1-2006. The first half of the program has a different proposal number: 10729.

ACS/SBC 10872

Lyman Continuum Emission in Galaxies at z=1.2

Lyman continuum photons produced in massive starbursts may have played a dominant role in the reionization of the Universe. Starbursts are important contributors to the ionizing metagalactic background at lower redshifts as well. However, their contribution to the background depends upon the fraction of ionizing radiation that escapes from the intrinsic opacity of galaxies below the Lyman limit. Current surveys suggest escape fractions of a few percent, up to 10%, with very few detections {as opposed to upper limits} having been reported. No detections have been reported in the epochs between z=0.1 and z=2. We propose to measure the fraction of escaping Lyman continuum radiation from 15 luminous z~1.2 galaxies in the GOODS fields. Using the tremendous sensitivity of the ACS Solar-blind Channel, we will reach AB=30 mag., allowing us to detect an escape fraction of 1%. We will correlate the amount of escaping radiation with the photometric and morphological properties of the galaxies. A non-detection in all sources would imply that QSOs provide the overwhelming majority of ionizing radiation at z=1.3, and it would strongly indicate that the properties of galaxies at higher redshift have to be significantly different for galaxies to dominate reionization. The deep FUV images will also be useful for extending the FUV study of other galaxies in the GOODS fields.

ACS/WFC 10813

MgII Absorption Line Systems: Galaxy Halos or the Metal-Enriched IGM?

MgII QSO absorption lines detected in the spectra of background QSOs were used over a decade ago to infer that all redshift z > 0.2 galaxies have gaseous halos of radius ~ 60 kpc. The actual size of the halo was believed to be proportional to the luminosity of the galaxy. However, these conclusions are now much harder to understand in light of the results from numerical simulations which show how gas evolves in the universe. These models predict that gas and galaxies merely share the same filamentary structures defined by dark matter. If these models are correct, how are MgII systems and galaxies really related? We can better understand the distribution of absorbing gas if we FIRST select galaxies close to QSO sightlines and THEN search for MgII absorption at the redshift of the intervening galaxies. This is the antithesis of the original experiments which sought to find absorbing galaxies based on known MgII systems. The frequency with which we detect MgII lines from randomly selected galaxies should enable us to better understand if absorption arises in the halos of individual galaxies, or if MgII merely arises in the same IGM that galaxies inhabit. We have used ground-based telescopes to indentify twenty z = 0.31-0.55 galaxies within 14-51 kpc of a g < 20 QSO, and to search for MgII absorption at the galaxies' redshifts. Surprisingly, we find that only 50% of our QSOs show MgII absorption. In this proposal, we seek multi-color ACS images of twelve of the fields to i} correlate the incidence of MgII with galaxy morphology; ii} determine if absorption {or lack thereof} is related to galaxy disks or halos; iii} search for signs of galaxy interactions which may explain the large cross-sections of MgII systems; and iv} look for faint interloping galaxies closer to the line of sight than the one we identified. An important component of the program is to observe each field in the SDSS g-, r- and i-bands, to permit an estimate of the photometric redshift of any objects which lie closer to the QSO sightline than the identified galaxy, and which might actually be responsible for the absorption.

ACS/WFC 10892

Imaging Dust Near Type Ia Supernovae: A New Light Echo Candidate

Light echos are excellent probes of circumstellar and interstellar dust. We have been using the unique power of light echos to study the progenitors of type Ia supernovae, but currently, only two distant echos are known: SN 1991T and 1998bu. Both events show dust close to the progenitors and the echo light curve suggests that the dust actually surrounds SN 1991T. Here we propose to use HST to confirm a third echo and study its size, brightness and color.

NIC1/NIC2/NIC3 8793

NICMOS Post-SAA calibration – CR Persistence Part 4

A new procedure proposed to alleviate the CR-persistence problem of NICMOS. Dark frames will be obtained immediately upon exiting the SAA contour 23, and every time a NICMOS exposure is scheduled within 50 minutes of coming out of the SAA. The darks will be obtained in parallel in all three NICMOS Cameras. The POST-SAA darks will be non-standard reference files available to users with a USEAFTER date/time mark. The keyword ‘USEAFTER=date/time’ will also be added to the header of each POST-SAA DARK frame. The keyword must be populated with the time, in addition to the date, because HST crosses the SAA ~8 times per day so each POST-SAA DARK will need to have the appropriate time specified, for users to identify the ones they need. Both the raw and processed images will be archived as POST-SAA DARKSs. Generally we expect that all NICMOS science/calibration observations started within 50 minutes of leaving an SAA will need such maps to remove the CR persistence from the science images. Each observation will need its own CRMAP, as different SAA passages leave different imprints on the NICMOS detectors.

NIC2 10847

Coronagraphic Polarimetry of HST-Resolved Debris Disks

We propose to take full advantage of the recently commissioned coronagraphic polarimetry modes of ACS and NICMOS to obtain imaging polarimetry of circumstellar debris disks that were imaged previously by the HST coronagraphs, but without the polarizers. It is well established that stars form in gas-rich protostellar disks, and that the planets of our solar system formed from a circum-solar disk. However, the connection between the circumstellar disks that we observe around other stars and the processes of planet formation is still very uncertain. Mid-IR spectral studies have suggested that disk grains are growing in the environments of young stellar objects during the putative planet-formation epoch. Furthermore, structures revealed in well resolved images of circumstellar disks suggest gravitational influences on the disks from co-orbital bodies of planetary mass. Unfortunately, existing imaging data provides only rudimentary information abou the disk grains and their environments. Our proposed observations, which can be obtained only with HST, will enable us to quantitatively determine the sizes of the grains and optical depths as functions of their location within the disks {i.e., detailed tomography}. Armed with these well-determine physical and geometrical systemic parameters, we will develop a set of self-consistent models of disk structures to investigate possible interactions between unseen planets and the disks from which they formed. Our results will also calibrate models of the thermal emission from these disks, that will in turn enable us to infer the properties of other debris disks that cannot be spatially resolved with current or planned instruments and telescopes.

NIC2, ACS/WFC 10802

SHOES-Supernovae, HO, for the Equation of State of Dark energy

The present uncertainty in the value of the Hubble constant {resulting in an uncertainty in Omega_M} and the paucity of Type Ia supernovae at redshifts exceeding 1 are now the leading obstacles to determining the nature of dark energy. We propose a single, integrated set of observations for Cycle 15 that will provide a 40% improvement in constraints on dark energy. This program will observe known Cepheids in six reliable hosts of Type Ia supernovae with NICMOS, reducing the uncertainty in H_0 by a factor of two because of the smaller dispersion along the instability strip, the diminished extinction, and the weaker metallicity dependence in the infrared. In parallel with ACS, at the same time the NICMOS observations are underway, we will discover and follow a sample of Type Ia supernovae at z > 1. Together, these measurements, along with prior constraints from WMAP, will provide a great improvement in HST’s ability to distinguish between a static, cosmological constant and dynamical dark energy. The Hubble Space Telescope is the only instrument in the world that can make these IR measurements of Cepheids beyond the Local Group, and it is the only telescope in the world that can be used to find and follow supernovae at z > 1. Our program exploits both of these unique capabilities of HST to learn more about one of the greatest mysteries in science.

WFPC2 10748

WFPC2 CYCLE 14 Standard Darks

This dark calibration program obtains dark frames every week in order to provide data for the ongoing calibration of the CCD dark current rate, and to monitor and characterize the evolution of hot pixels. Over an extended period these data will also provide a monitor of radiation damage to the CCDs.

FLIGHT OPERATIONS SUMMARY:

Significant Spacecraft Anomalies: (The following are preliminary reports of potential non-nominal performance that will be investigated.)

HSTARS: (None)

COMPLETED OPS REQUEST: (None)

COMPLETED OPS NOTES: (None)

                           SCHEDULED      SUCCESSFUL 
FGS GSacq                06                     06 
FGS REacq                09                      09 
OBAD with Maneuver   30                      30 

SIGNIFICANT EVENTS: (None)