Dartmouth Scientists to Illuminate Major Survey of the Night Sky

Assistant professors of physics and astronomy Burçin Mutlu-Pakdil and Elisabeth Newton received Scialog Collaborative Innovation Awards on Feb. 20 from the Research Corporation for Science Advancement (RCSA). The competitive grants were awarded to eight cross-disciplinary teams to advance the foundational science needed to realize the full potential of the upcoming Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST). 

The LSST is a 10-year survey of the Southern Hemisphere sky that will be carried out at the Vera C. Rubin Observatory in northern Chile. Every night for a decade, the Rubin Observatory's telescope will take hundreds of images of the sky using a mounted 3.2 gigapixel camera, compiling 20 terabytes of data nightly—an unprecedented data set of the sky that will enable scientists to address some of the deepest questions about the universe, its evolution, and the objects within it.

"It's wonderful that the cutting-edge research of professors Mutlu-Pakdil and Newton have been recognized with this competitive award, which will further their explorations of low-mass galaxies and time variability of astrophysical phenomena," says Ryan Hickox, professor and chair of the Department of Physics and Astronomy. "The Scialog Awards are another illustration of the world-leading physics and astronomy research at Dartmouth."

Mutlu-Pakdil and Newton are participants in the RCSA's Scialog: Early Science with the LSST, a three-year initiative that aims to accelerate breakthroughs by building a network of scientists that cross traditional disciplinary silos. (Scialog is short for "science plus dialogue.")

While the images and data gathered by the survey will result in many discoveries, the Rubin Observatory was specifically designed to advance the understanding of the nature of dark matter and dark energy, create an inventory of the solar system, map the Milky Way galaxy, and study objects that move or change in brightness.

Mutlu-Pakdil received the award with Grinnell College's Charlotte Christensen and the University of Washington's Nora Shipp for their project, "Dwarf Debris and Dark Matter: Searching for Evidence of Hierarchical Formation in the Stellar Halos of Dwarf Galaxies."

"We will develop a framework that will enable us to interpret the upcoming observational data on hierarchical formation around low-mass galaxies, which we expect to uncover in the LSST era," says Mutlu-Pakdil. "Our project will allow us to place these exciting discoveries in a cosmological context."

Mutlu-Pakdil's prior research findings include the discovery of an extremely rare galaxy with a unique circular structure, now commonly referred to as Burçin's Galaxy, and the first description of a double-ringed elliptical galaxy—enhancing the understanding of galaxy formation and evolution. She is also passionate about collaborating with fellow scientists from underrepresented backgrounds to bring their insights to the table.

"As an observational astrophysicist, I am excited to collaborate with leading experts in theory and modeling to develop a new framework that will guide our understanding of galaxy formation and dark matter," she says.
 

Newton received the award alongside Cornell University's Anna Ho and the University of Toronto's Maya Fishbach for their project, "Multimessenger Transients in AGN Disks."

"We will develop new methods to look for energetic events that occur in the disks around supermassive black holes," Newton explains. "My group's contribution to the project will involve developing machine learning tools for time-series data, which could have wider applicability to Rubin's LSST."

An observational astronomer, Newton studies the physics of stars and the planets that orbit them, investigating how the spin and magnetic properties of stars are related, and how these stellar properties change with time. She also works to detect and characterize exoplanets around magnetically active stars to understand how they evolve.

"I study stars and exoplanets—a very different regime from this project—but there is a connection in the tools that we will use, and I'm excited to see where that leads," she says. "I'm also excited to work with people I would not have had the chance to work with."

The first data preview from the Rubin Observatory LSST camera, the world's largest digital camera, is anticipated to be available to researchers in March. 

"After a lot of uncertainty over the years about the telescope and its construction, we are thrilled to see it nearing completion and look forward to great science coming from this Scialog that will help move astronomy and astrophysics forward for decades to come," RCSA President and CEO Daniel Linzer said in the awards announcement.