Abstract:
Every second a supernova is exploding somewhere in the universe. Astronomers cannot see all of them, but the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF), a robotic camera based at Caltech’s Palomar Observatory enables scientists to capture thousands of such explosions every year, shedding new light on the volatile cosmos. In this talk, Shri Kulkarni, ZTF’s principal investigator and the George Ellery Hale Professor of Astronomy and Planetary Science, will discuss the history and development of ZTF, a public-private partnership aimed at the systematic exploration of the optical night sky. Using an extremely wide field of view camera, ZTF scans the entire Northern sky every two days, discovering objects that erupt or vary in brightness such as supernovae, stars being swallowed by black holes, planets being engulfed by the parent stars, comets, and asteroids. Kulkarni will share some of the phenomena this cutting-edge instrument has revealed in its first years of operation and discuss how astro-informatics (machine learning, AI) is powering an unprecedented new era of studying the dynamic night sky.
Speaker’s Bio:
Prof. Shri Kulkarni, the George Ellery Hale Professor of Astronomy and Planetary Science at Caltech, is the 2024 Shaw Prize winner in Astronomy. He has made groundbreaking discoveries in time-domain astronomy, including millisecond pulsars, brown dwarfs, gamma-ray bursts, and supernovae. His pioneering work led to the creation and leadership of the Palomar Transient Factory and the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF), revolutionizing our understanding of the dynamic optical sky.
Contact Information: outreach@icts.res.in