PATT-linked grant for Warwick Astronomy & Astrophysics Group, April 2015 to March 2017
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Warwick
Department Name: Physics
Abstract
At the end of their lives stars settle into one of three possible final compact states known as white dwarfs, neutron stars or black-holes. All three of these are incredibly dense by our standards, so much so that to a neutron star matter at Earth-like densities is only a little different from a vacuum. Many examples of such objects are known, and they are often far from being inactive as they can be so closely paired up with other stars than we can see the effects of gas transferring from one star to the compact object. In such a process the gas can be heated to many millions of degrees making these object efficient X-ray sources. Furthermore, both white dwarfs and neutron stars can show explosive effects as material accreting onto them sparks into uncontrollable fusion, generating vast amounts of energy within seconds or minutes. Such explosions can light up the furthest reaches of the Universe to reveal the history of the build up of structures in the Universe. Our work centres on trying to understand such processes and how the various objects that we see relate to one another. The purpose of this grant is to support the travel needed to observe these objects on ground-based telescopes where we carry out observations of the high-speed processes that occur as material crashes onto these remarkable objects. The grant will also support work on exoplanets, where high-precision measurements of brightness and velocity are essential to the measurements of the masses and radii of planets required to understand the nature of planets far beyond our Solar System.
Organisations
Publications
Ashley R
(2019)
Evidence for bimodal orbital separations of white dwarf-red dwarf binary stars
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Bours M
(2016)
Long-term eclipse timing of white dwarf binaries: an observational hint of a magnetic mechanism at work
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Byrne C
(2021)
Binary evolution pathways of blue large-amplitude pulsators
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Casewell S
(2018)
The direct detection of the irradiated brown dwarf in the white dwarf-brown dwarf binary SDSS J141126.20+200911.1
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Cooke B
(2020)
Two Transiting Hot Jupiters from the WASP Survey: WASP-150b and WASP-176b
in The Astronomical Journal
Gentile Fusillo N
(2015)
A photometric selection of white dwarf candidates in Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 10
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Ghodla S
(2022)
Forward modelling the O3(a+b) GW transient mass distributions with bpass by varying compact remnant mass and SNe kick prescriptions
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Green M
(2018)
A 15.7-Minute AM CVn Binary Discovered in K2
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Hodgkin S
(2021)
Gaia Early Data Release 3 Gaia photometric science alerts
in Astronomy & Astrophysics
Hollands M
(2018)
The Gaia 20 pc white dwarf sample
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Kirk J
(2016)
Transmission spectroscopy of the inflated exoplanet WASP-52b, and evidence for a bright region on the stellar surface
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Kowalski A
(2016)
M DWARF FLARE CONTINUUM VARIATIONS ON ONE-SECOND TIMESCALES: CALIBRATING AND MODELING OF ULTRACAM FLARE COLOR INDICES
in The Astrophysical Journal
Manser C
(2016)
Another one grinds the dust: variability of the planetary debris disc at the white dwarf SDSS J104341.53+085558.2
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Marsh TR
(2016)
A radio-pulsing white dwarf binary star.
in Nature
Massey P
(2021)
Testing Evolutionary Models with Red Supergiant and Wolf-Rayet Populations
in The Astrophysical Journal
McAllister M
(2017)
Using Gaussian processes to model light curves in the presence of flickering: the eclipsing cataclysmic variable ASASSN-14ag
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
McAllister M
(2017)
SDSS J105754.25+275947.5: a period-bounce eclipsing cataclysmic variable with the lowest-mass donor yet measured
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
McAllister M
(2019)
The evolutionary status of Cataclysmic Variables: eclipse modelling of 15 systems
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Misra R
(2019)
Puzzling blue dips in the black hole candidate Swift J1357.2 - 0933, from ULTRACAM, SALT, ATCA, Swift, and NuSTAR
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Muñoz-Darias T
(2019)
Hard-state Accretion Disk Winds from Black Holes: The Revealing Case of MAXI J1820+070
in The Astrophysical Journal Letters
Parsons S
(2016)
The crowded magnetosphere of the post-common-envelope binary QS Virginis
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Parsons S
(2017)
Testing the white dwarf mass-radius relationship with eclipsing binaries
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Parsons S
(2018)
The scatter of the M dwarf mass-radius relationship
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Premachandra S
(2016)
PRECISION EPHEMERIDES FOR GRAVITATIONAL WAVE SEARCHES. II. CYG X-2
in The Astrophysical Journal
Description | This is a grant for travel to telescopes; see the associated consolidated grant for details |
Exploitation Route | To drive their own research |
Sectors | Education |
Description | Facebook Live session hosted by Coventry Telegraph |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Engagement focused website, blog or social media channel |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Regional |
Primary Audience | Media (as a channel to the public) |
Results and Impact | This was a ~30 minute long live question session with questions pre-submitted and submitted during the session on astronomy in general and my research in particular. The session went out to 12,000 feeds, and there were around 670 following it. It was a first attempt at running this sort of event by the Coventry Telegraph. It was aimed at school children in their holidays. Took place on 22 August 2016. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016 |
URL | https://www.facebook.com/coventrytelegraph/videos/1188249861232166 |
Description | Live Q&A on the internet in conjunction with Coventry Telegraph |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A broadcast e.g. TV/radio/film/podcast (other than news/press) |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Regional |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | This was Facebook Live session, hosted by the Coventry Telegraph, so reaching a wider audience than had I run it myself. I firt talked about my area of research and then answered questions sent in by the viewers. It lasted about an hour. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016 |
URL | https://www.facebook.com/coventrytelegraph/videos/1188249861232166 |
Description | Press release associated with Nature paper on AR Sco |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Media (as a channel to the public) |
Results and Impact | Through the University of Warwick's press office I commissioned space artist Mark Garlick to develop a visualisation of the system in question. I also posted a movie on youtube showing brightness variations, and the ESO press office created an artistic movie illustrating the system also on youtube which has close to 300,000 views. There are links to these on a wikipedia page for the object. The release was picked up widely and led to requests for interviews (e.g. with the BBC's Sky-at-Night magazine, see the associated web link). |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016 |
URL | http://www.skyatnightmagazine.com/news/white-dwarf-blasts-companion-radiation |
Description | Visit to astronomy society, Stratford |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Regional |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | This was a talk about AR Sco, an object I published a paper in Nature last year. There were many questions following the talk. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2007 |
URL | http://www.astro.org.uk/schedule/index.php |