Status Report

NASA Hubble Space Telescope Daily Status Report #4393

By SpaceRef Editor
June 29, 2007
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NASA Hubble Space Telescope Daily Status Report #4393
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Notice: For the foreseeable future, the daily reports may contain apparent discrepancies between some proposal descriptions and the listed instrument usage. This is due to the conversion of previously approved ACS WFC or HRC observations into WFPC2, or NICMOS observations subsequent to the loss of ACS CCD science capability in late January.

HUBBLE SPACE TELESCOPE DAILY REPORT # 4393

– Continuing to collect World Class Science

DAILY REPORT # 4393

PERIOD COVERED: UT June 27, 2007 (DOY 178)

OBSERVATIONS SCHEDULED

WFPC2 10800

Kuiper Belt Binaries: Probes of Early Solar System Evolution

Binaries in the Kuiper Belt are a scientific windfall: in them we have relatively fragile test particles which can be used as tracers of the early dynamical evolution of the outer Solar System. We propose to continue a Snapshot program using the ACS/HRC that has a demonstrated discovery potential an order of magnitude higher than the HST observations that have already discovered the majority of known transneptunian binaries. With this continuation we seek to reach the original goals of this project: to accumulate a sufficiently large sample in each of the distinct populations collected in the Kuiper Belt to be able to measure, with statistical significance, how the fraction of binaries varies as a function of their particular dynamical paths into the Kuiper Belt. Today’s Kuiper Belt bears the imprints of the final stages of giant-planet building and migration; binaries may offer some of the best preserved evidence of that long-ago era.

WFPC2 10877

A Snapshot Survey of the Sites of Recent, Nearby Supernovae

During the past few years, robotic {or nearly robotic} searches for supernovae {SNe}, most notably our Lick Observatory Supernova Search {LOSS}, have found hundreds of SNe, many of them in quite nearby galaxies {cz < 4000 km/s}. Most of the objects were discovered before maximum brightness, and have follow-up photometry and spectroscopy; they include some of the best-studied SNe to date. We propose to conduct a snapshot imaging survey of the sites of some of these nearby objects, to obtain late-time photometry that {through the shape of the light and color curves} will help reveal the origin of their lingering energy. The images will also provide high-resolution information on the local environments of SNe that are far superior to what we can procure from the ground. For example, we will obtain color-color and color-magnitude diagrams of stars in these SN sites, to determine the SN progenitor masses and constraints on the reddening. Recovery of the SNe in the new HST images will also allow us to actually pinpoint their progenitor stars in cases where pre- explosion images exist in the HST archive. This proposal is an extension of our successful Cycle 13 snapshot survey with ACS. It is complementary to our Cycle 15 archival proposal, which is a continuation of our long-standing program to use existing HST images to glean information about SN environments.

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.

NIC1/NIC2/NIC3 8794

NICMOS Post-SAA calibration – CR Persistence Part 5

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.

WFPC2 10818

Very Young Globular Clusters in M31 ?

We propose to use HST’s unique high spatial resolution imaging capabilities to conclusively confirm or refute the presence of alleged very young globular clusters in M31. Such young globular clusters with ages < 3 Gyr are not present in our galaxy, and, if real, would lead to a striking difference in the age distribution of the GCs between M31 and the Millky Way. If the apparent presence of very young globular clusters in M31 is confirmed through our proposed ACS imaging {now WFPC2 imaging} with HST, this would suggest major differences in the history of assembly of the two galaxies, with probable substantial late accretion into M31 which did not occur in our own galaxy.

WFPC2 11140

Can mass-ejections from late He-shell flash stars constrain convective/reactive flow modeling of stellar interiors?

The existence of H-deficient knots around the central stars of the planetary nebulae Abell 30 and Abell 78 is still unexplained. We hypothesize that these knots were ejected during a very late helium-shell flash {= very late thermal pulse, VLTP} suffered by the precursor white dwarf stars. If this is true, then the characteristics of these knots {mass, velocity, density, spatial distribution} allow to draw conclusions on the course of the hydrogen- ingestion flash detonation that is triggered by the He-shell flash. This provides important, otherwise inaccessible constraints for the hydrodynamical modeling of convective/reactive flows in stellar interiors. Understanding the physics of these flows is not only important for the understanding of these particular central stars, but also for the frequent, very similar convective/reactive events that determine the nucleosynthesis in Pop. III stars. With this proposal we want to proof or discard the idea that the H-deficient knots are resulting from a VLTP. If true, then they can be exploited for flash-physics diagnostics. We propose a simple test. We search for such knots around five H-deficient central stars {PG1159 stars}. Our models predict, that only those stars with residual nitrogen in the atmosphere have suffered a VLTP and, hence, should have expelled knots. We therefore want to take [O III] images of stars which have photospheric N and those which do not.

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)

                               SCHEDULED      SUCCESSFUL 

FGS GSacq                        7                   7 
FGS REacq                        5                   5 
OBAD with Maneuver              26                  26 

COMPLETED OPS NOTES: (None)

SIGNIFICANT EVENTS:

Intercept SMS SA176R02 was received, reviewed and is authorized. The intercept time is 179/19:36:26z

SpaceRef staff editor.