Visibility Predictions for Near-future Satellite Megaconstellations: Latitudes near 50° Will Experience the Worst Light Pollution

Megaconstellations of thousands to tens of thousands of artificial satellites (satcons) are rapidly being developed and launched. These satcons will have negative consequences for observational astronomy research, and are poised to drastically interfere with naked-eye stargazing worldwide should mitigation efforts be unsuccessful. Here we provide predictions for the optical brightnesses and on-sky distributions of several satcons, including Starlink, OneWeb, Kuiper, and StarNet/GW, for a total of 65,000 satellites on their filed or predicted orbits. We develop a simple model of satellite reflectivity, which is calibrated using published Starlink observations. We use this model to estimate the visible magnitudes and on-sky distributions for these satellites as seen from different places on Earth, in different seasons, and different times of night. For latitudes near 50° north and south, satcon satellites make up a few percent of all visible point sources all night long near the summer solstice, as well as near sunrise and sunset on the equinoxes. Altering the satellites’ altitudes only changes the specific impacts of the problem. Without drastic reduction of the reflectivities, or significantly fewer total satellites in orbit, satcons will greatly change the night sky worldwide.

Generative Adversarial Neural Networks and Deep Learning: Successful Cases and Advanced Approaches

Cross-domain artificial intelligence (AI) frameworks are the keys to amplify progress in science. Cutting edge deep learning methods offer novel opportunities for retrieving, optimizing, and improving different data types. AI techniques provide new ways for enhancing and polishing existing models that are used in applied sciences. New breakthroughs in generative adversarial neural networks (GANNs/GANs) and deep learning allow to drastically increase the quality of diverse graphic samples obtained with research equipment. All these innovative approaches can be compounded into a unified academic and technological pipeline that can radically elevate and accelerate scientific research and development. The authors analyze a number of successful cases of GAN and deep learning applications in applied scientific fields (including observational astronomy, health care, materials science, deep fakes, bioinformatics, and typography) and discuss advanced approaches for increasing GAN and DL efficiency in terms of performance calibration using modified data samples, algorithmic enhancements, and various hybrid methods of optimization.

Painlevé–Gullstrand form of the Lense–Thirring Spacetime

The standard Lense–Thirring metric is a century-old slow-rotation large-distance approximation to the gravitational field outside a rotating massive body, depending only on the total mass and angular momentum of the source. Although it is not an exact solution to the vacuum Einstein equations, asymptotically the Lense–Thirring metric approaches the Kerr metric at large distances. Herein we shall discuss a specific variant of the standard Lense–Thirring metric, carefully chosen for simplicity, clarity, and various forms of improved mathematical and physical behaviour, (to be more carefully defined in the body of the article). We shall see that this Lense–Thirring variant can be viewed as arising from the linearization of a suitably chosen tetrad representing the Kerr spacetime. In particular, we shall construct an explicit unit-lapse Painlevé–Gullstrand variant of the Lense–Thirring spacetime, one that has flat spatial slices, a very simple and physically intuitive tetrad, and extremely simple curvature tensors. We shall verify that this variant of the Lense–Thirring spacetime is Petrov type I, (so it is not algebraically special), but nevertheless possesses some very straightforward timelike geodesics, (the “rain” geodesics). We shall also discuss on-axis and equatorial geodesics, ISCOs (innermost stable circular orbits) and circular photon orbits. Finally, we wrap up by discussing some astrophysically relevant estimates, and analyze what happens if we extrapolate down to small values of r; verifying that for sufficiently slow rotation we explicitly recover slowly rotating Schwarzschild geometry. This Lense–Thirring variant can be viewed, in its own right, as a “black hole mimic”, of direct interest to the observational astronomy community.

COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF SKY QUALITY AND METEOROLOGICAL VARIABLES DURING THE TOTAL LUNAR ECLIPSE ON 14-15 APRIL 2014 AND THEIR EFFECT ON QUALITATIVE MEASUREMENTS OF THE BORTLE SCALE

A total lunar eclipse plausibly has an influence on the variation of some environmental physical parameters, specifically on the conditions of the sky brightness, humidity and temperature. During the eclipse on 14th - 15th April 2014, these parameters were measured with a photometer and a weather station. The obtained results allow the comparison, practically, of the optimal conditions for observational astronomy work in the Tatacoa desert and, therefore, to certify it as suitable place to develop night sky astronomical observations. This investigation determined, to some extent, the suitability of this place to carry out astronomical work and research within the optical range. Thus, the changes recorded during the astronomical phenomenon allowed the classification of the sky based on the Bortle Scale.

Applications for Microwave Kinetic Induction Detectors in Advanced Instrumentation

In recent years Microwave Kinetic Inductance Detectors (MKIDs) have emerged as one of the most promising novel low temperature detector technologies. Their unrivaled scalability makes them very attractive for many modern applications and scientific instruments. In this paper we intend to give an overview of how and where MKIDs are currently being used or are suggested to be used in the future. MKID based projects are ongoing or proposed for observational astronomy, particle physics, material science and THz imaging, and the goal of this review is to provide an easily usable and thorough list of possible starting points for more in-depth literature research on the many areas profiting from kinetic inductance detectors.

All-sky visible and near infrared space astrometry

The era of all-sky space astrometry began with the Hipparcos mission in 1989 and provided the first very accurate catalogue of apparent magnitudes, positions, parallaxes and proper motions of 120 000 bright stars at the milliarcsec (or milliarcsec per year) accuracy level. Hipparcos has now been superseded by the results of the Gaia mission. The second Gaia data release contained astrometric data for almost 1.7 billion sources with tens of microarcsec (or microarcsec per year) accuracy in a vast volume of the Milky Way and future data releases will further improve on this. Gaia has just completed its nominal 5-year mission (July 2019), but is expected to continue in operations for an extended period of an additional 5 years through to mid 2024. Its final catalogue to be released $\sim $ ∼ 2027, will provide astrometry for $\sim $ ∼ 2 billion sources, with astrometric precisions reaching 10 microarcsec. Why is accurate astrometry so important? The answer is that it provides fundamental data which underpin much of modern observational astronomy as will be detailed in this White Paper. All-sky visible and Near-InfraRed (NIR) astrometry with a wavelength cutoff in the K-band is not just focused on a single or small number of key science cases. Instead, it is extremely broad, answering key science questions in nearly every branch of astronomy while also providing a dense and accurate visible-NIR reference frame needed for future astronomy facilities.

Records of Planetary Observations in Ancient Japan Before the 11th Century

The records of planetary observations in Japan in the 7th century ad are treated separately from other records because they are written in the Nihongi. It is known that Japanese observational astronomy was recorded in the 7th century ad, but astronomy in Japan did not evolve straightforward in that century. There are thirty-one records that exist from that time, including four records on the Moon and planets. Correspondingly, a new interpretation of Japanese ancient history has been proposed. For the 8th, 9th, and 10th centuries, records have been compiled on the relative motion of the Moon and the planets, the motion of planets in the constellations, and stars seen in the daytime, as stated in Japanese recorded history. These records are written in Chinese, as in the case of the Nihongi, but have been translated into English. The orbits of the Moon and planets have been calculated using the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) development ephemeris (DE) in order to confirm the validity of the records. The numbers of records and observations are not the same because one record may contain multiple observations. The accuracy of individual observations is discussed.