Measuring the masses of rocky planets is quite difficult, as the relevant signal produced by such planets is often dwarfed by stellar activity by an order of magnitude or more. Developing a more robust way to isolate the stellar activity in these measurements is crucial to the search for Earth-like planets. We estimate the mass of Earth-size planet Kepler-78b using a Gaussian process estimator to describe the stellar activity in both photometric and radial velocity (RV) data, confirming previous results with a more robust technique that can be extended toward Earth analogues.

We compiled a sample of 57 galaxies with spectroscopically confirmed redshifts and SPIRE detections in all three bands at z = 2.5-6.4, and compared their SPIRE colors with SED templates from local and high-z libraries. We find that local calibrations are inconsistent with high-z observations. For high-z libraries, the templates with an evolution from z = 0 to 3 can describe the average colors of the observations at high redshift well. Based on the templates, we defined color cuts to divide the SPIRE color-color diagram into different regions with different mean redshifts. We tested this method and two other color cut methods using a larger sample (783 galaxies) with photometric redshifts. We find that these color cuts can separate the sample into subsamples with different mean redshifts, but the dispersion of redshifts in each subsample is considerably large. Additional information is needed for better sampling.

We describe preliminary measurements of the pairwise velocity dispersion (PVD) of galaxies in the Galaxy and Mass Assembly (GAMA) survey as a function of projected separation and galaxy luminosity. Due to the faint magnitude limit (r < 19.8) and highly-complete spectroscopic sampling of the GAMA survey, we are able to measure the PVD to smaller scales and for lower-luminosity galaxies than previous SDSS-based work. We see no strong scale-dependence at most luminosities in the quasi-linear regime. We observe an apparent drop in PVD towards very small scales (below ≈ 0.1h−1 Mpc), but this could in part be due to a restriction of the streaming model employed. At intermediate scales, the PVD is highest (~ 500 km/s) at intermediate luminosities, dropping at both fainter and brighter luminosities.

This talk focuses on the challenges facing the recent discovery of variations of the stellar initial mass function in massive early-type galaxies, with special emphasis on the constraints via gravity-sensitive spectral features.

A feed-forward neural network which can account for nonlinear relationship was used to model total solar irradiance (TSI). A single layer feed-forward neural network with Levenberg-marquardt back-propagation algorithm have been implemented for modeling daily total solar irradiance from daily photometric sunspot index, and core-to-wing ratio of Mg II index data. In order to obtain the optimum neural network for TSI modeling, the root mean square error (RMSE) and mean absolute error (MAE) have been taken into account. The modeled and measured TSI have the correlation coefficient of about R=0.97. The neural networks (NNs) model output indicates that reconstructed TSI from solar proxies (photometric sunspot index and Mg II) can explain 94% of the variance of TSI. This modeled TSI using NNs further strengthens the view that surface magnetism indeed plays a dominant role in modulating solar irradiance.

In this work we study the effect of satellite accretion on the building-up of the radial stellar age distribution in the discs of spiral galaxies. In addition, we analyse its effect on other chemical and dynamical properties of these systems up to their outskirts.

Various observations show peculiar features in the Galactic Center region, such as loops and filamentary structure. It is still unclear how such characteristic features are formed. Magnetic field is believed to play very important roles in the dynamics of gas in the Galaxy Center. Suzuki et al. (2015) performed a global magneto-hydrodynamical simulation focusing on the Galactic Center with an axisymmetric gravitational potential and claimed that non-radial motion is excited by magnetic activity. We further analyzed their simulation data and found that vertical motion is also excited by magnetic activity. In particular, fast down flows with speed of ~100 km/s are triggered near the footpoint of magnetic loops that are buoyantly risen by Parker instability. These downward flows are accelerated by the vertical component of the gravity, falling along inclined field lines. As a result, the azimuthal and radial components of the velocity are also excited, which are observed as high velocity features in a simulated position-velocity diagram. Depending on the viewing angle, these fast flows will show a huge variety of characteristic features in the position-velocity diagram.

At redshift z~1.7 the Universe was at the peak of its star-formation activity. It is thus a puzzle why some galaxies, many of them very massive (M* ⩾ 1011 M⊙), had already chosen to stop forming stars. These ultra-massive galaxies, guaranteed to be the central galaxies of their host dark matter halos, must have attained very high rates of star formation to assemble their stellar masses in such a short amount of time. Using the largest (to date) K-selected gzKs survey of passive galaxies (in an effective area of ~ 27.5 deg2) we study the demographics of these dead monsters, hoping to help understand the quenching mechanism that shut them down.

Catastrophic failure is an unsolved problem existing in the most photometric redshift estimation approaches for a long history. In this study, we propose a novel approach by integration of k-nearest-neighbor (KNN) and support vector machine (SVM) methods together. Experiments based on the quasar sample from SDSS show that the fusion approach can significantly mitigate catastrophic failure and improve the accuracy of photometric redshift estimation.

To study the molecular environment and feedback of Herbig Ae/Be (HAB) stars, We mapped four HAB stars' nearby region with CO (1-0) and its isotopes by the 13.7m millimeter telescope of Purple Mountain Observatory. The results show that new stars are forming in the nearby molecular cores and HAB stars give them an extra pressure. On the other hand, HAB stars are the main heat source of their surrounding gas.

We use the Magneticum Pathfinder (www.magneticum.org) hydro-dynamical cosmological simulation set to investigate the buildup of the stellar component within cosmological structures. These simulations result in the self-consistent formation of ICM, AGNs, and both spheroidal and disk galaxy populations, which properly reproduce the observed properties.

We show first results of a multifrequency survey focused on the mechanisms driving the transformation of cluster galaxies, from late to earlier S0-types. We compare the ram-pressure effects seen on 21cm-HI images with those mechanisms affecting the old stellar disks seen on deep optical and NIR images. Our targets are the Abell clusters A85, A496, A2670, which span different relaxation degrees, masses and X-ray luminosities.

We summarize work on the central parsec of the Galactic center based on imaging and spectroscopic observations at the Keck and Gemini telescopes. These observations include stellar positions in two dimension and the velocity in three dimensions. Spectroscopic observations also enables measurements of the physical properties of individual stars, such as the spectral type and in some cases the effective temperature, metallicity, and surface gravity. These observations show a complex stellar population with a young (4-6 Myr) compact star cluster in the central 0.5 pc embedded in in an older and much more massive nuclear star cluster. Surprisingly, the old late-type giants do not show a cusp profile as long been expected from theoretical work. The majority of the stars have higher than solar metallicity, with only about 6% of the stars having [M/Fe] < −0.5, which is consistent with an origin from the MW disk.

Peculiar motion introduces systematic variations in the observed luminosity distribution of galaxies. This allows one to constrain the cosmic peculiar velocity field from large galaxy redshift surveys. Using around half a million galaxies from the SDSS Data Release 7 at z ~ 0.1, we demonstrate the applicability of this approach to large datasets and obtain bounds on peculiar velocity moments and σ8, the amplitude of the linear matter power spectrum. Our results are in good agreement with the ΛCDM model and consistent with the previously reported ~ 1% zero-point tilt in the SDSS photometry. Finally, we discuss the prospects of constraining the growth rate of density perturbations by reconstructing the full linear velocity field from the observed galaxy clustering in redshift space.

Twenty years ago, no planets were known outside our own solar system. Since then, the discoveries of ~1500 exoplanets have radically altered our views of planets and planetary systems. This revolution is due in no small part to the Kepler Mission, which has discovered >1000 of these planets and >4000 planet candidates. While Kepler has shown that small rocky planets and planetary systems are quite common, the quest to find Earth's closest cousins and characterize their atmospheres presses forward with missions such as NASA Explorer Program's Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) slated for launch in 2017 and ESA's PLATO mission scheduled for launch in 2024.

These future missions pose daunting data processing challenges in terms of the number of stars, the amount of data, and the difficulties in detecting weak signatures of transiting small planets against a roaring background. These complications include instrument noise and systematic effects as well as the intrinsic stellar variability of the subjects under scrutiny. In this paper we review recent developments in the Kepler transit search pipeline improving both the yield and reliability of detected transit signatures.

Many of the phenomena in light curves that represent noise can also trigger transit detection algorithms. The Kepler Mission has expended great effort in suppressing false positives from its planetary candidate catalogs. Over 18,000 transit-like signatures can be identified for a search across 4 years of data. Most of these signatures are artifacts, not planets. Vetting all such signatures historically takes several months' effort by many individuals. We describe the application of machine learning approaches for the automated vetting and production of planet candidate catalogs. These algorithms can improve the efficiency of the human vetting effort as well as quantifying the likelihood that each candidate is truly a planet. This information is crucial for obtaining valid planet occurrence rates. Machine learning approaches may prove to be critical to the success of future missions such as TESS and PLATO.

We present the relative fraction of baryons and dark matter at various radii in galaxies. For spiral galaxies, this fraction measured in a galaxy's inner parts is typically baryon-dominated (maximal) and dark-matter dominated (sub-maximal) in the outskirts. The transition from maximal to sub-maximal baryons occurs within the inner parts of low-mass disk galaxies (with Vtot ≤ 200 km s−1) and in the outer disk for more massive systems. The mean mass fractions for late- and early-type galaxies vary significantly at the same fiducial radius and circular velocity, suggesting a range of galaxy formation mechanisms. A more detailed discussion, and resolution of the so-called “maximal disk problem”, is presented in Courteau & Dutton, ApJL, 801, 20.

Based on SDSS and South Galactic Cap U-band Sky Survey (SCUSS) photometry, we try to study the photometric metallicity of the Sagittarius (Sgr) stream in the south Galactic cap. We find that the Sgr stream has a wider metallicity distribution, and that its median metallicity is richer than that of the field halo stars. The neighboring field halo stars in our studied fields can be modeled by a two-Gaussian model, with peaks at [Fe/H]= −1.9 and [Fe/H]= −1.5. The metallicity distribution function (MDF) of the mixed population (Sgr stream and halo stars) has peaks at [Fe/H]= −1.9, [Fe/H]= −1.5 and [Fe/H]= −0.5, respectively.

CALIFA data show that isolated disk galaxies present a common gas-phase metallicity gradient, with a characteristic slope of -0.1dex/re between 0.3 and 2 disk effective radius re (Sanchez et al. 2014). Here we construct a simple model to investigate which processes regulate the formation and evolution.

Sensitive, high resolution observations of Galactic neutral hydrogen (Hi) reveal an intricate network of slender linear features, much as sensitive surveys of dust in Galactic molecular clouds reveal ubiquitous filamentary structure. Across the high Galactic latitude sky, diffuse Histructures are aligned with the interstellar magnetic field, as revealed by background starlight polarization (Clark, Peek, & Putman 2014) and by Planck 353 GHz polarized dust emission (Clark et al. 2015). These discoveries were enabled by the Rolling Hough Transform, a recently developed, open source machine vision algorithm.

Started its regular, daily operational phase in 2011, by the occasion of the Symp264 in the XXVII IAU GA at Rio de Janeiro, the results so far obtained show that the Heliometer of the Observatorio Nacional fulfilled its planed performance of single measurement to the level of few tens of milli-arcsecond, freely pivoting around the heliolatitudes without systematic deviations or error enhancement. We present and discuss the astrometric additions required on ground based astronomic programs. We also discuss instrumental and observations terms, namely the constancy of the basic heliometric angle, against which the measurements are made, and the independence to meteorological and pointing conditions.