Lowell Observatory Near-Earth-Object Search (LONEOS) was a project designed to discover asteroids and comets that orbit near the Earth. The project, funded by NASA, was directed by astronomer Ted Bowell of Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona. The LONEOS project began in 1993 and ran until the end of February 2008.
LONEOS, in its final configuration, used a 0.6-meter f/1.8 Schmidt telescope, acquired from Ohio Wesleyan University in 1990, and a Lowell-built 16 megapixelCCD detector. This combination of instruments provided a field of view of 2.88 by 2.88 degrees (8.3 square degrees). It had a maximum nightly scan area of about 1,000 square degrees (covered four times). The instrument could cover the entire accessible dark sky in about a month. The CCD has detected asteroids as faint as visual magnitude 19.8 but its typical limiting visual magnitude was 19.3. The instrument is located at Lowell Observatory's dark sky site, Anderson Mesa Station, near Flagstaff, Arizona, US.
Four computers were used. Two were used for frame reductions, one for telescope pointing control and one for camera control. The camera control software had scripting capability and could control all the other computers.
Techniqueedit
Asteroids were found by obtaining four pictures (frames) of the same region of sky, each frame temporally separated by 15 to 30 minutes. The set of four frames were then submitted to reduction software which located all star-like sources on the frame and identified sources that moved with asteroid-like motion. The observer visually examined all asteroid detections that had motion different from a typical main-belt asteroid. Human examination was required because most putative NEO detections were not real but some kind of imaging artifact.
All asteroid positions were converted to equatorial coordinates. Various USNO star catalogs[2] were used for this conversion until 2007. Then the Sloan Digital Sky Survey catalog was used, along with supplemental information from the Carlsberg Catalog[3] and the 2MASS catalog. Asteroid brightness was converted to standard visual magnitude. These data, along with the time of the observations, were sent to the Minor Planet Center (MPC) from which they were distributed to the scientific community. Potential near-Earth objects were handled expeditiously so that other observers could locate the asteroid on the same night and make further observations.
Telescope operation was automated to the extent that the survey could be run all night without observer intervention. However, the telescope was seldom operated in the automatic mode because an observer was required to reduce data promptly and to correct any malfunctions that might have occurred.
Amateur observers made a significant contribution during this time with independent NEO discoveries and by performing follow-up observations of recent discoveries made by the NASA sponsored surveys.[4]
NEO-discovery statisticsedit
The table below lists the number of discoveries made by LONEOS each year of operation. Asteroids thought to be larger than one kilometer in diameter were used as benchmarks in assessing survey completeness. Hence, some table elements have two numbers separated by a slash. The second number represents the number of discoveries larger than one kilometer. The column labeled "Asteroid Observations" is the number of observations sent to the Minor Planet Center. Each asteroid was typically observed four times (once per frame) each night.[5]
A complete list of LONEOS NEO observations can be found at the NeoDys[6] web site.
Other scienceedit
The LONEOS frame archive provides a data set with wide spatial and temporal sky coverage. Other investigators have used these characteristics to produce the following research papers and presentations.
Investigating the Distinct Components of the Galactic Stellar Halo RR Lyrae from the LONEOS-I Survey, American Astronomical Society, AAS Meeting #211, #163.02, Huber, Mark; Miceli, A.; Cook, K. H.; Rest, A.; Narayan, G.; Stubbs, C. W.
Evidence for Distinct Components of the Galactic Stellar Halo from 838 RR Lyrae Stars Discovered in the LONEOS-I Survey, eprint arXiv:0706.1583,Miceli, A.; Rest, A.; Stubbs, C. W.; Hawley, S. L.; Cook, K. H.; Magnier, J.Johal, E. A.; Krisciunas, K.; Bowell, E.; Koehn, B.
Detecting variable objects with the LONEOS photometric database: 15000 square degrees of variability measurements down to 19th magnitude in R, American Astronomical Society, 199th AAS Meeting, #101.10; Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, Vol. 33, p. 1463, Rest, A.; Miceli, A.; Miknaitis, G.; Covarrubias, R.; Stubbs, C.; Magnier, E.; Koehn, B.; Bowell, T.; Cook, K.; Krisciunas, K.
Highlightsedit
1999 April 12, Shawn Hermann discovers an Aten, 1999 HF1, more than three kilometers in diameter.[7]
1999 May, the 1999 JD6 peanut-shaped asteroid (a contact binary) was first discovered.[8]
2004 May 20, Brian Skiff finds an asteroid, (434326) 2004 JG6, with the (then) smallest orbit. It is the second asteroid found that has an orbit entirely within Earth's orbit.[14]
LONEOS staffedit
Lowell staff:
Principal investigator: Dr. Edward Bowell
Computer programming: Dr. Bruce Koehn
Professional observers: Brian Skiff, Bill Ferris, Mike Van Ness, Shawn Hermann, Jason Sanborn
Volunteer observers: Christopher Onken, Jennifer Palguta, Wendy Kelly, Thomas Grimstad, Lori Levy, Robert Cash, Bliss Bliss, James Ashley
Collaborators:
CCD performance modeling: Dr. Steve Howell, WIYN/NOAO:
Asteroid detection modeling: Dr. Karri Muinonen, University of Helsinki
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This article needs additional citations for verification Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources Unsourced material may be challenged and removed Find sources Lowell Observatory Near Earth Object Search news newspapers books scholar JSTOR October 2009 Learn how and when to remove this message Lowell Observatory Near Earth Object Search LONEOS was a project designed to discover asteroids and comets that orbit near the Earth The project funded by NASA was directed by astronomer Ted Bowell of Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff Arizona The LONEOS project began in 1993 and ran until the end of February 2008 Lowell Observatory Near Earth Object SearchAlternative namesLONEOSOrganizationNASA Observatory code699 LocationFlagstaff Coconino County ArizonaCoordinates35 12 10 N 111 39 52 W 35 2028 N 111 6644 W 35 2028 111 6644Websiteasteroid wbr lowell wbr edu wbr asteroid wbr loneos wbr loneos wbr htmlLocation of Lowell Observatory Near Earth Object Search edit on Wikidata Minor planets discovered 22 077 1 see List of minor planets Main index Contents 1 Hardware 2 Technique 3 Discoveries 3 1 NEO discovery statistics 4 Other science 5 Highlights 6 LONEOS staff 7 See also 8 References 9 External linksHardware editLONEOS in its final configuration used a 0 6 meter f 1 8 Schmidt telescope acquired from Ohio Wesleyan University in 1990 and a Lowell built 16 megapixel CCD detector This combination of instruments provided a field of view of 2 88 by 2 88 degrees 8 3 square degrees It had a maximum nightly scan area of about 1 000 square degrees covered four times The instrument could cover the entire accessible dark sky in about a month The CCD has detected asteroids as faint as visual magnitude 19 8 but its typical limiting visual magnitude was 19 3 The instrument is located at Lowell Observatory s dark sky site Anderson Mesa Station near Flagstaff Arizona US Four computers were used Two were used for frame reductions one for telescope pointing control and one for camera control The camera control software had scripting capability and could control all the other computers Technique editAsteroids were found by obtaining four pictures frames of the same region of sky each frame temporally separated by 15 to 30 minutes The set of four frames were then submitted to reduction software which located all star like sources on the frame and identified sources that moved with asteroid like motion The observer visually examined all asteroid detections that had motion different from a typical main belt asteroid Human examination was required because most putative NEO detections were not real but some kind of imaging artifact All asteroid positions were converted to equatorial coordinates Various USNO star catalogs 2 were used for this conversion until 2007 Then the Sloan Digital Sky Survey catalog was used along with supplemental information from the Carlsberg Catalog 3 and the 2MASS catalog Asteroid brightness was converted to standard visual magnitude These data along with the time of the observations were sent to the Minor Planet Center MPC from which they were distributed to the scientific community Potential near Earth objects were handled expeditiously so that other observers could locate the asteroid on the same night and make further observations Telescope operation was automated to the extent that the survey could be run all night without observer intervention However the telescope was seldom operated in the automatic mode because an observer was required to reduce data promptly and to correct any malfunctions that might have occurred Discoveries edit nbsp Number of NEOs detected by various surveys LINEAR NEAT Spacewatch LONEOS CSS Pan STARRS NEOWISE All others As of 2017 LONEOS is credited by the Minor Planet Center with the discovery of 22 077 minor planets between 1998 and 2008 The discoveries include main belt asteroids near Earth Objects NEO and Mars crossers 1 During the period of LONEOS operation several other NASA funded NEO searches were underway number of discoveries in parentheses 1 LINEAR 148 287 Spacewatch 135 705 Mount Lemmon Survey 54 542 Near Earth Asteroid Tracking 41 092 and Catalina Sky Survey 26 294 Amateur observers made a significant contribution during this time with independent NEO discoveries and by performing follow up observations of recent discoveries made by the NASA sponsored surveys 4 NEO discovery statistics edit The table below lists the number of discoveries made by LONEOS each year of operation Asteroids thought to be larger than one kilometer in diameter were used as benchmarks in assessing survey completeness Hence some table elements have two numbers separated by a slash The second number represents the number of discoveries larger than one kilometer The column labeled Asteroid Observations is the number of observations sent to the Minor Planet Center Each asteroid was typically observed four times once per frame each night 5 Year Asteroid Observations NEAs PHAs Atens Apollos Amors Comets 1998 122 550 7 4 0 0 0 3 2 4 2 1 1999 128 220 14 7 5 2 2 6 3 6 2 6 2000 271 237 38 10 4 3 0 18 5 17 5 6 2001 626 976 42 11 9 4 0 17 4 21 7 7 2002 407 064 21 4 3 3 1 9 0 9 3 3 2003 720 528 54 10 17 5 1 26 3 23 6 2 2004 716 152 39 4 9 5 0 22 4 12 0 4 2005 820 609 42 4 8 6 0 15 1 21 3 8 2006 679 927 19 1 2 0 0 11 1 8 0 2 2007 630 469 12 0 2 2 0 4 0 6 0 3 2008 88 953 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 Total 5 212 685 289 55 59 30 4 131 23 127 28 42 A complete list of LONEOS NEO observations can be found at the NeoDys 6 web site Other science editThe LONEOS frame archive provides a data set with wide spatial and temporal sky coverage Other investigators have used these characteristics to produce the following research papers and presentations Investigating the Distinct Components of the Galactic Stellar Halo RR Lyrae from the LONEOS I Survey American Astronomical Society AAS Meeting 211 163 02 Huber Mark Miceli A Cook K H Rest A Narayan G Stubbs C W Evidence for Distinct Components of the Galactic Stellar Halo from 838 RR Lyrae Stars Discovered in the LONEOS I Survey eprint arXiv 0706 1583 Miceli A Rest A Stubbs C W Hawley S L Cook K H Magnier J Johal E A Krisciunas K Bowell E Koehn B Detecting variable objects with the LONEOS photometric database 15000 square degrees of variability measurements down to 19th magnitude in R American Astronomical Society 199th AAS Meeting 101 10 Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society Vol 33 p 1463 Rest A Miceli A Miknaitis G Covarrubias R Stubbs C Magnier E Koehn B Bowell T Cook K Krisciunas K Highlights edit1999 April 12 Shawn Hermann discovers an Aten 1999 HF1 more than three kilometers in diameter 7 1999 May the 1999 JD6 peanut shaped asteroid a contact binary was first discovered 8 1999 December 2 Bruce Koehn discovers the first Earth crossing Damocloid asteroid 1999 XS35 later identified as a comet citation needed 9 2001 August 14 Mike Van Ness discovers the second Earth crossing Damocloid C 2001 OG108 LONEOS 10 2001 November 20 discovers Near Earth object 153814 2001 WN5 that will pass 0 00166 AU 248 000 km 154 000 mi from the Earth on 2028 June 26 11 2003 September 27 Bob Cash finds the then closest Earth crossing asteroid 2003 SQ222 12 2003 October 15 Brian A Skiff recovers 1937 UB Hermes a lost asteroid for 66 years 13 2004 May 20 Brian Skiff finds an asteroid 434326 2004 JG6 with the then smallest orbit It is the second asteroid found that has an orbit entirely within Earth s orbit 14 LONEOS staff editLowell staff Principal investigator Dr Edward Bowell Computer programming Dr Bruce Koehn Professional observers Brian Skiff Bill Ferris Mike Van Ness Shawn Hermann Jason Sanborn Volunteer observers Christopher Onken Jennifer Palguta Wendy Kelly Thomas Grimstad Lori Levy Robert Cash Bliss Bliss James Ashley Collaborators CCD performance modeling Dr Steve Howell WIYN NOAO Asteroid detection modeling Dr Karri Muinonen University of HelsinkiSee also editList of minor planet discoverers Discovering dedicated institutions Pan STARRS Planetary Data System PDS SpaceguardReferences edit a b c Minor Planet Discoverers by number Minor Planet Center 10 July 2017 Retrieved 5 October 2017 USNO Image and Catalogue Archive Archived from the original on 2017 11 04 Retrieved 2008 03 02 CMC14 Yahoo Groups Summary of PHA and NEA Discoveries by Discoverers NEODyS MPEC 1999 H17 1999 HF1 NASA Snaps Pics Of Space Peanut As It Passes By Earth Ted Ranosa Tech Times 3 August 2015 MPEC 1999 X19 1999 XS35 MPEC 2001 P40 2001 OG108 JPL Close Approach Data 153814 2001 WN5 2011 01 04 last obs arc 14 9 years Retrieved 2011 10 16 MPEC 2003 T03 2003 SQ222 MPEC 2003 T74 1937 UB HERMES MPEC 2004 J60 2004 JG6External links editLONEOS Planetary Data System PDS Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Lowell Observatory Near Earth Object Search amp oldid 1199300394, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,
