Date: August 17, 2011
Title: The REU Program at NOAO
Organization: The National Optical Astronomy Observatory (NOAO)
Link: NOAO NOAO’s Twitter feed: @NOAONorth
Description: The Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) program is a National Science Foundation program that recruits undergraduate science and math students to participate in summer research programs at various sites around the country. The National Optical Astronomy Observatory has run an REU program for many years. In this podcast, the 2011 REU students discuss their summer experiences at NOAO.
Bio: Rob Sparks is a science education specialist in the EPO group at NOAO and works on the Galileoscope project (www.galileoscope.org), providing design, dissemination and professional development. He also blogs at halfastro.wordpress.com.
REU Students: Alisa Fersch, Brittany Johnstone, Morgan Rehnberg, Phillip Adams, Christine Welling, Nick Jimenez, Joanna Taylor, Samantha DeMarco
Sponsor: This episode of the 365 Days of Astronomy podcast is sponsored by the National Optical Astronomy Observatory. NOAO is a US national research and development center for ground-based nighttime astronomy. We provide astronomers access to world-class observing facilities on a peer-reviewed basis. Our mission is to engage in programs to develop the next generation of telescopes, instruments, and software tools necessary to enable exploration and investigation through the observable Universe. For information on observing proposals or our public programs, please visit www.noao.edu for more information.
Transcript:
Rob:. Hi, I would like to welcome you to this episode of the 365 Days of Astronomy podcast. This is Rob Sparks from the National Optical Astronomy Observatory. We have a special episode here today. I am here with the National Optical Astronomy Observatory’s Research Experience for Undergraduates, also known as REU students for the summer. That is a National Science Foundation program that takes place at labs around the country where undergraduate students spend the summer doing research in their field. They do it in all fields, not just astronomy, but I am here with mostly astronomy but a couple of solar people as well here today dong research in solar physics and solar astronomy.
I would like to have them introduce themselves quick and tell you a little about their research.
Alyssa: Hi, my name is Alyssa Firsch from Roxbury New York and I go to school at Wesleyan University in Conneticut. This summer I am working on light pollution and using GLOBE at Night data which is a citizen science campaign that anybody can submit data on how bright their sky is worldwide. Working with the data that was collected around Tucson and collecting some more of my own, and then I am going to compare that to some data from Arizona Game and Fish (Department) about where the bats are going and see if there is any correlation between the bright parts of Tucson and where the bats are avoiding.
Brittany: Hi, my name is Brittany Johnstone from Gettysburg, Pennsylvania and I go to Westchester University, also in Pennsylvania. This summer my project is working with extreme ultraviolet light and the changes in the magnetic field when there is a solar flare. So I am looking at correlations between the two to see if one causes the other to occur.
Morgan: Hi, I am Morgan Renberg. I am from York, Pennsylvania and I got to school at Beloit College in Wisconsin. I am working this summer to develop software to help small groups analyze data that they take about near Earth asteroids. There are a lot of groups both big and small, both professional and amateur that do this sort of analysis. The big groups have good software but the smaller groups, the amateur groups, lack coherent software to make analyzing and submitting these observations easy to do. We want this good software because we want them to tell us when that big one is coming.
Phillip: And that’s a hard one to follow up after. My name is Phillip Adams. I am from Wallingford, Pennsylvania and I go to school at Wesleyan University in Connecticut as well. My project this summer is doing statistical analysis of data taken from the Sun and I am looking at the differences between the regular Sun and the coronal holes that put out the solar wind that you hear a lot about with regards to effecting our satellites and our electronics as well as solar flares and coronal mass ejections, the same things you have heard on the news before, and trying to decipher what causes what. What is relevant to other formations of things on the Sun and generally trying to make a solid map of what the Sun is trying to tell us about itself.
Christine: My name is Christine Welling. I am from Claysville, Pennsylvania and I go to Dickinson College which is also in Pennsylvania. My project this summer is working with the Galileoscope. It was a cheap kit telescope produced in 2009 for the International Year of Astronomy and one of the things that they did with it was distribute it in developing countries, but they didn’t come up with a mounting system to be distributed with the Galileoscope. So I have been working on inexpensive ways for people to steady the Galileoscope with parts they can either get cheaply or would have around where they live.
Nick: Hi, my name is Nick Jimenez and I am from Montville, Maine and I go to school at Alfred University in New York and this summer I have been looking at the light curves of variable stars to find the period and other properties of the stars with data from the Kepler Telescope which is a telescope that is space based and looking for exoplanets with high precision photometry so it is very good for looking at variable stars too. And so comparing the periods of the data using an online periodogram service to previous surveys we can see how they are different and how much Kepler has improved upon these periods and what we know about these variable stars.
Jo: Hi, I am Jo Taylor and I am from Wilkinson, Indiana and I go to Indiana University in Bloomington. My project this summer is producing spectrum and then measuring the redshifts of galaxies in a galaxy cluster, specifically looking at redshift selected AGN, looking at their three linginal positions can give us some insight into the evolution and environment of the AGNs and specifically galaxy clusters in particular because they are in a very turbulent and changing environment.
Samantha: Hi, my name is Samantha DeMarco. I am from Buffalo, New York. I go to school at Emory-Riddle Aeronautucal University in Daytona Beach, Florida. This summer I am working with surface images from the near side of the Sun and comparing them with chromosphere and coronal images also from the near side of the Sun, the side of the Sun that we can see. I am writing programs using IDL to display these images, draw contours of elevation, and extract information regarding intensities, brightness, and many other things of the active regions on the Sun. From these observations we are hoping to develop a relationship between the images, to be able to extrapolate and map the surface of the far side of the Sun. We do not have surface images of the far side of the Sun. Therefore, by applying this relationship we are hoping we can apply this relationship with the coronal images we have from the far side of the Sun and hopefully obtain more information about the surface of the far side of the Sun.
Rob: Okay, great. So that’s our crew we have here today. I would like to open up the floor for a couple of questions here. First, how do you see this helping you in your future studies or what skills are you developing this summer that will help you in your future studies whether they be graduate studies or something else? Who would like to address that?
Phillip: Well, this is my first time working with any sort of real computer programming. So as a potential astronomer in training its pretty much a useful skill to start learning and seeing how it’s all done. How astronomers are looking for all the little bits of information in all the data they take is enlightening. It makes me understand just what it is I am going to be getting into and how much knowledge there is waiting to be discovered out there.
Jo: Because it’s a low pressure environment to get real time experience about graduate experience and beyond that so you get to see the only side of astronomy that undergraduates can view which is data reduction, the grunt work, which really gives you a lot of insight into data and how its taken. And then you get to present your research to professional astronomers and that’s great. You get practice because you are gong to have to do that a lot later in your career.
Morgan: I want to echo what Jo is saying and say that I think this gives us a great opportunity to find out whether we even like doing research. Research isn’t for everybody and it probably isn’t for some of us and it’s important to know that before you try and get into graduate school. Having this opportunity to spend a summer working with scientists and doing actual research is a fantastic way to sort of test the water.
Rob: Thank you. You think you are doing grunt work now, wait until you get to graduate school! I know you do a lot of things besides research here. I know you have done some trips on the weekend and that sort of thing. So thinking about the whole summer, what is the best part about doing an REU? (pause) Keeping in mind that this is a family friendly podcast.
Phillip: So far I would have to say being able to go explore some place I had never been. I mean, I am originally from the east coast, had never really been much past Chicago or staying on the seaboard states themselves, anywhere off those in general. So now coming all the way out to Arizona and getting to see a whole different portion of the United States, the land masses, the climates, the geology, all these things I had no idea about before and getting to see how the differing geological formations and weather patterns make astronomy possible here more than it is in Pennsylvania is pretty interesting.
Samantha: I have to say I guess I came into this thinking it was going to be completely different and I am just blown away every day because I didn’t realize how much it was going to be about me and about me figuring out what I want to do in grad school or me learning and there is just so much opportunity at this job. They just let you experience so many different things. They bring you to the observatory to get real observing time on telescopes and just everything. They make you feel comfortable here. They take you on field trips. You are with people your age and its very relaxed and you are also doing real experiments and reducing data and just writing programs and getting this experience you just don’t get at school because you are so focused on the physics or the math or all the other courses that you need to take. So this is definitely a great experience to see if this is something that you think you could be doing for many years to come.
Morgan: I think the coolest part is getting to meet all the researchers here. These are the people whose papers we read and whose book chapters we study and here we are sitting down talking to them and working out problems with them. It brings you a lot closer and its not this far off person writing these papers sort of decrees from God about astronomy. Here we can sort of hash it out one on one and that’s a unique opportunity.
Alyssa: I would have to say my favorite part is when as part of this REU they took us on a big field trip to New Mexico and we spent four or five days over the July 4th weekend and we got to meet other REU students at one of the solar observatories in New Mexico and we got to go to the Very Large Array which is great astronomy tourism. As astronomy REU students we get to some places, in some buildings, where the normal doesn’t get to go so that’s always fun. Yeah, that was my favorite part.
Rob: Finally, one more question. This is a very competitive program to get into and I know that because I read many of the applications to help select a couple of you. Do you have any advice for students considering applying for an REU position next summer or in the future?
Morgan: I can’t possibly stress the importance of computer programming experience. Whether or not you know the languages that we use in astronomy or whether you know something else they all use the same basic concepts so take programming class, take a computer science class in high school. Learn on your own. You need the computer science experience to have a good shot at doing something cool.
Phillip: I think the thing that helped me get into this program the most is the fact that I took the initiative to go and talk to some of the professors I had one or two classes with but never really collaborated with and asked them what they thought about REUs and what they knew about the written recommendations and if they would be okay writing one for me, if they would be comfortable writing a good recommendation for me and asking them questions about what they think my chances are, what they think I should do to help myself get in. The teachers are your school have dealt with this quite a lot, probably their whole career so don’t be afraid to ask them.
Christine: I would say to apply to programs that seem interesting even if it’s not exactly what you want to do, you might find something really really fun. I hadn’t done any sort of engineering, designing kind of stuff before, but I had worked in the machine shop in my school and I knew I liked that so I wanted to try things that were sort of related to that and I actually applied to programs that weren’t astronomy as well because that’s what I wanted to try.
Nick: Talk to your teachers. Try and see if there is anything that can get you more involved in astronomy and physics like getting some research under your belt before you even apply is probably a good thing too. So if you can get those opportunities that is definitely something to look forward to.
Samantha: Yeah, I definitely agree with what Nick just said. I mean you do need the computer programming familiarity. You don’t necessarily have to be an expert in it to apply for an REU because that’s part of the learning experience is having the time to learn new programming languages and in this job that’s all you do is just keep learning and it’s great. I definitely think some of the things that helped me were just being very driven, ambitious, applying to many REUs, no matter where they were, yeah, even apply to all of them! There are many, many REUs and I applied to ones outside my comfort zone like coming all the way to Arizona or going to Hawaii. You just never know where it can take you. And just having the research under your belt. Even if you think its just pointes research, even if its just data reduction it’s so worth it to see that environment and it definitely helps you on your resume to have that under your belt. That’s it.
Brittany: I know coming into this, I hadn’t had any computer experience, like programming so my shots of getting the REUs were probably pretty low, but I still got in. So I would say don’t rule any REUs out. Apply to all of them whether you think you will get in or not. So like Sam said, apply to a lot. Just be proactive.
Rob: Okay, well thank you for joining me. It’s been great talking with you today and I hope to see you back here in a few years maybe as part of your graduate studies coming to Kitt Peak and doing some observations. This is Rob Sparks from the National Optical Astronomy Observatory.
End of podcast:
365 Days of Astronomy
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