The Faulkes Telescope Project& Bioastronomy

Institute for Astronomy

University of Hawaii

K. Meech

Faulkes Telescope Project

• Educational Partnership:– Educational Trust of Great Britain (UK)

– Institute for Astronomy (HI)

• Purpose: Astronomy Outreach• Location:

– Haleakala, Maui Hawaii

– Australia

• Operations– Remote control from the UK

– Observe from classrooms

– Queue Scheduled

– 30% of evenings for Hawaii

The Faulkes Telescope

• Professional Telescope– 2-m f/10 primary – alt/az

– 12 arc min FOV

– Guider to 17th mag

• Optical Detector– EEV CCD42-20 CCD:

2048x2048 pixels (0.135”)

– 4.6 x 4.6’ FOV

– Filters: Sloan u', g', r', i', z', B, V, ND

• Near IR imager

Project StatusMOU 6/26/99

Site blessing 11/02/01

Phase 1 construction – 3/2002

Enclosure – Scotland

• Ship: 7/02

• Install 11/22/02

Telescope ship 8/02

Telescope

• Install 1/23/03

• Electronics 7/03

• First light 8/03

• Operations late 03

Faulkes Education Program• TOPS Education Outreach Program – S’03 (NSF/NASA)• Take “master teachers”• Train for remote observing• Simulate the Faulkes Experience

– 3 days learning to plan observations– 1 day planning, learn web interface– Receive data, learn image processing– 1 weekend to analyze data and formulate a report

What can students do?• Young Variables: star form• Kuiper Belt Studies

– Colors & physical study

– Recovery orbits

• Comet Studies– Rotation

– Space mission support

– NEO Characterization

What can students do?

• Extrasolar Planet Transits• Synoptic Studies of Jupiter

– Rotation

• Synoptic Studies of Mars– Dust storms

Courtesy of D. Charbonneau, CaltechCourtesy of D. Charbonneau, Caltech

Project Goals

• Develop a teacher mentor network of teachers

• Astronomer-teacher liasons

• Provide software

• Develop an image data archive

• Increase astronomy content in classrooms– Curriculum materials

– Science fair participation