Astrophysics - Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics

deepCR: Cosmic Ray Rejection with Deep Learning

Cosmic ray (CR) identification and replacement are critical components of imaging and spectroscopic reduction pipelines involving solid-state detectors. We present deepCR, a deep learning based framework for CR identification and subsequent image …

GROWTH on S190426c: Real-time Search for a Counterpart to the Probable Neutron Star-Black Hole Merger using an Automated Difference Imaging Pipeline for DECam

The discovery of a transient kilonova following the gravitational-wave (GW) event GW170817 highlighted the critical need for coordinated rapid and wide-field observations, inference, and follow-up across the electromagnetic spectrum. In the southern …

GROWTH on S190510g: DECam Observation Planning and Follow-up of a Distant Binary Neutron Star Merger Candidate

The first two months of the third Advanced LIGO and Virgo observing run (2019 April-May) showed that distant gravitational-wave (GW) events can now be readily detected. Three candidate mergers containing neutron stars (NS) were reported in a span of …

A recurrent neural network for classification of unevenly sampled variable stars

Astronomical surveys of celestial sources produce streams of noisy time series measuring flux versus time (`light curves'). Unlike in many other physical domains, however, large (and source- specific) temporal gaps in data arise naturally due to …

Multi-Messenger Astrophysics: Harnessing the Data Revolution

The past year has witnessed discovery of the first identified counterparts to a gravitational wave transient (GW 170817A) and a very high-energy neutrino (IceCube-170922A). These source identifications, and ensuing detailed studies, have realized …

A Machine-learning Method to Infer Fundamental Stellar Parameters from Photometric Light Curves

A fundamental challenge for wide-field imaging surveys is obtaining follow-up spectroscopic observations: there are >10$^9$ photometrically cataloged sources, yet modern spectroscopic surveys are limited to åisebox-0.5ex few× 10$^6$ targets. As we …

Probing the distance and morphology of the Large Magellanic Cloud with RR Lyrae stars

We present a Bayesian analysis of the distances to 15,040 Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) RR Lyrae stars using $V$- and $I$-band light curves from the Optical Gravitational Lensing Experiment, in combination with new $z$-band observations from the Dark …

Towards precision distances and 3D dust maps using broadband Period--Magnitude relations of RR Lyrae stars

We determine the period-magnitude relations of RR Lyrae stars in 13 photometric bandpasses from 0.4 to 12 μm using timeseries observations of 134 stars. The Bayesian formalism, extended from our previous work to include the effects of line-of-sight …

First Searches for Optical Counterparts to Gravitational-wave Candidate Events

During the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory and Virgo joint science runs in 2009-2010, gravitational wave (GW) data from three interferometer detectors were analyzed within minutes to select GW candidate events and infer their …

Discovery and Redshift of an Optical Afterglow in 71 deg$^2$: iPTF13bxl and GRB 130702A

We report the discovery of the optical afterglow of the γ-ray burst (GRB) 130702A, identified upon searching 71 deg$^2$ surrounding the Fermi Gamma-ray Burst Monitor (GBM) localization. Discovered and characterized by the intermediate Palomar …