This $597,879 project grant awarded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) Division of Astronomical Sciences will enable the Regents of the University of Michigan to extend their ongoing research on discovering and studying the faintest trans-Neptunian objects (TNOs) in the outer solar system using advanced computational techniques.
The project will leverage the DECam Ecliptic Exploration Project (DEEP) survey, which has been allocated 46.5 nights on the 4-meter Blanco telescope, to detect an estimated 7,000 ultra-faint TNOs. The research team will develop a novel "shift-and-stack" algorithm called HELIOSTACK to efficiently link these deep detections across multiple observing seasons, enabling the measurement of physical and dynamical properties for roughly 400 of the faintest TNOs ever observed. In addition, the project will discover approximately 20,000 new asteroids and provide time-series photometry data on these objects, contributing to the broader astronomical community. The award will directly fund the PhD thesis of one graduate student and involve several undergraduate students in data analysis, observational astronomy, and research dissemination activities.
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