Observational techniques meeting #5

Future surveys Narrow (pencil beam): HDF UDF GOODs Cosmos MCT JWST

Future surveys Deep/wide: CFHTLS (Megacam) Subaru Suprimecam Hypersuprimecam DES

Future surveys All/most sky/time domain: PTF PS1/skymapper LSST

The Palomar Transient Factory There is nothing like searching, if you want to find something. You usually find something, if you search, but it is not always quite the something you were after. Thorin Oakenshild

Palomar Transient Factory (PTF) A 100 Mega-pixel, 7 deg 2 camera (CFH12K) on the 48 inch Schmidt Telescope at Palomar that: -- scans 10% of the sky every few days finds ~1000 transients per year that are tracked by small telescopes for photometry and larger (3-10m) for spectroscopy -- is creating a deep sky image and lightcurves in 2 bands (g’ and R) that will yield galactic science -- H-alpha surveys in four bands starting May 2011.

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P60: Followup P60: Followup P48: Discovery Engine 7.26 sq. deg. camera P48: Discovery Engine 7.26 sq. deg. camera The Palomar Transient Factory Instrumentation, system design, first results Law, Kulkarni, Dekany et al PASP L Science plansRau, Kulkarni, Law et al PASP R 2010 survey statusLaw et al SPIE 7735 P200: Followup P200: Followup

The PTF camera field of view 92 MPix 1.0 arcsec sampling R=21 in 60 seconds

FWHM and Limiting Magnitude

In 2010: 81% of nights usable 36,933 science images >7 TB

PTF Publications (so far) Real-Time Detection of a Highly Subluminous Type II-P Supernova with PTF 2011 ApJL submitted The Extreme Hosts of Extreme Supernovae 2010 ApJ accepted Evidence for an FU Orionis Outburst from a Classical T Tauri Star 2010 submitted to ApJ PTF10nvg: An Outbursting Class I Protostar in the Pelican/North American Nebula 2010, submitted to ApJ Hubble Space Telescope Studies of Nearby Type Ia Supernovae 2010 submitted to ApJL Galaxy Zoo Supernovae 2010 accepted by MNRAS Rapidly Decaying Supernova 2010X: A Candidate ".Ia" Explosion 2010 ApJL, 723, Supernova PTF 09uj: A Possible Shock Breakout from a Dense Circumstellar Wind 2010 ApJ, 724, The Palomar Transient Factory Survey Camera: 1st Year Performance and Results 2010 SPIE 7735 PTF10fqs: A Luminous Red Nova in the Spiral Galaxy Messier submitted to ApJ Core-Collapse Supernovae from PTF: Indications for a Different Population in Dwarf Galaxies ApJ Mysterious transients unmasked as the bright blue death throes of massive stars 2010 submitted to Nature The Palomar Transient Factory: System Overview, Performance and First Results 2009 PASP L Exploring the Optical Transient Sky with the Palomar Transient Factory 2009 PASP R The 12Kx8K CCD mosaic camera for the Palomar Transient Factory 2008 SPIE 7014

Detectors

Eye QE: 1-4% Short integration time (<1s)

Photographic plates QE: 1-2% Long integration times

Photomultipliers QE ~ 50% Long integration times Fast modes

Photomultipliers: applications Optical pulsars “Great errors” (video)

CMOS (active pixel arrays) Arrays of pixels, each composed on a photodetector (photodiode), amplifier, and readout electronics, realized on chip using CMOS technology MaterialSensitivity range (nm) Silicon InGaAs PbS High QE (>90%), fast readout, cheap, relatively high noise

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