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Formulate a clear and important question to answer

Formulate a clear and important question to answer What is the smallest mass at which brown dwarfs exist? Design observations that can answer the question Deep optical or IR imaging of a nearby cluster of young stars

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Formulate a clear and important question to answer

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  1. Formulate a clear and important question to answer What is the smallest mass at which brown dwarfs exist? Design observations that can answer the question Deep optical or IR imaging of a nearby cluster of young stars Identify telescopes/instruments that can perform these observations and that I have access to Hubble Space Telescope/Advanced Camera for Surveys Space Observing

  2. Prepare and submit a proposal before the next deadline (roughly once per year) Scientific case: - presents an important scientific question - reviews the results of previous studies - describes new observations that would answer it Technical case: - describes all details of the observations (target coordinates, wavelengths, exposure times, etc.) and how much time needed - explains why the requested telescope is the only one that can answer the question - demonstrates that the observations are feasible and will be able to answer the question Space Observing

  3. Review of proposals Panel of astronomers (Telescope Allocation Committee) reviews the proposals and ranks them The available telescope time for the next ~1 year is granted to the best proposals Oversubscription rate (requested time/available time) is usually near 10 for Hubble (only 10% of proposals are approved) Implementation of proposal If the proposal is approved, the astronomer designs and submits a fully detailed observing plan to the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) After verifying that the observing plan is feasible, STScI identifies windows of dates in which the plan can be performed The observing plan is added to the queue of all pending observations, and waits to be executed Space Observing

  4. Implementation of proposal (cont.) In addition to the observing time, STScI also provides funding to support the analysis of the data (~$3-5K per orbit) Data analysis After the observations have been performed, STScI makes the data available for retrieval its data archive Normally, the astronomer who submitted the proposal has a proprietary period of 1 year after observations are performed I which they have sole access to the data. After that, the data become available to the public, and anyone can analyze and publish the data. Major space observatories like Hubble have software “pipelines” that perform basic processing of the raw data. Additional processing is performed by the astronomer to extract the information they they are seeking. Space Observing

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