Summer Research Programme 2012
Oxford Astrophysics will run a summer research programme for undergraduate physics students. We anticipate taking about 8 students. Students from the second year and above are welcome to apply. Unfortunately we cannot take students from outside the EU unless you already have a work permit.
Students will work with a supervisor in the department, usually a postdoctoral researcher or lecturer, on a self-contained research project. There will also be some lectures on current astrophysics topics. Students are encouraged to take part in department life, joining researchers for coffee, discussions and seminars.
The projects run for typically 8 weeks, nominally June 25th - August 17th. The duration may be adjusted to be shorter or longer, or to accommodate summer travel. Students will be paid via a stipend (provisionally £180 per week). The project is full-time but hours can be discussed with your supervisor.
Applying
You should email a one-page-only application, in pdf format, to Ashling Morris (Ashling [dot] Morris [at] astro [dot] ox [dot] ac [dot] uk) by February 17 2012, with 'Summer intern application' in the subject line. Students should ask for a short academic reference letter to be emailed by the same date. Offers will be made early March.
On your 1-page application you should tell us why you are interested in the programme and which project(s) most interest you. Also include your contact details, your year and course, and contact details (including email) of your academic referee. Please also mention any computer programming experience and any previous research experience.
You are encouraged to informally contact the supervisor(s) to find out more details about the projects that interest you. For any administrative issues, contact Ashling Morris (Ashling [dot] Morris [at] astro [dot] ox [dot] ac [dot] uk). For questions about the program contact Dr Jo Dunkley (j [dot] dunkley [at] physics [dot] ox [dot] ac [dot] uk).
Projects
The projects span a wide range of our interests. Most of the research activity involves analytic and computing work.
Extrasolar planet atmospheres: what can we detect with next-generation space telescopes?
Supervisor: Joanna Eberhardt (Barstow)
Co-supervisor: Suzanne Aigrain
The atmospheres of extrasolar planets that transit their host stars can be studied using visible and infrared spectroscopy during such a transit. Proposed space telescopes such as the James Webb Space Telescope (NASA) and EChO (ESA) have the potential to significantly increase the amount of information we can obtain from transit observations. An ongoing project related to this involves the creation of model extrasolar planet atmospheres and the generation of synthetic visible and infrared spectra based on these models. The accuracy to which the atmospheric temperature structure and composition of such planets could be retrieved with JWST, EChO or other instruments is then tested. For this we use the Fortran NEMESIS atmospheric modelling and retrieval tool (Irwin et al. 2008) operated using an IDL front end. Familiarity with IDL would be an advantage but is not mandatory, and no knowledge of Fortran is required.
Modelling light curves of transiting exoplanets with the next generation of data analysis tools.
Supervisor: Neale Gibson
A planetary transit occurs when a planet passes in front of its host star, producing a characteristic light curve. From transit light curves we can measure many properties of the transiting system. However, the signals contain complex noise sources that we don't know much about a priori. We are starting to adapt new, advanced data analysis methods based on Gaussian Processes to key problems in exoplanets, ranging from radial velocity detection, star spot modelling and transmission and eclipse spectroscopy. The role of the Summer student will be to apply these to transit light curves, which will have applications in planet discovery via transit timing, or detailed measurements of planetary atmospheres. This will involve using and adapting a Python module written for this purpose, built partly in C. Familiarity with at least one of these languages is therefore desirable.
The youngest radio sources
Supervisor: Garret Cotter, Angela Taylor
We have deep radio images from the Very Large Array (VLA) and the Australia Telescope Compact Array (ATCA) that in combination can pinpoint radio sources with 'steeply rising' radio spectra characteristic of very-recently-triggered jets.
The student will find these youngest radio sources and use public Hubble Space Telescope and Herschel Space Telescope data to see if they are associated with galaxy mergers.
Citizen Science with the Zooniverse (two projects)
Supervisors: Rob Simpson, Chris Lintott
The Zooniverse suite of online projects (http://zooniverse.org) have enlisted the help of more than 500,000 global volunteers with tasks including galaxy classification, supernova detection, mapping the contents of the Milky Way and even the discovery of extra solar planets. Summer projects with the Zooniverse research team at Oxford can involve handling any of these data to make discoveries. Previous Summer projects include creating new catalogues of star clusters and galaxies using Spitzer Space Telescope data from the Milky Way Project (http://www.milkywayproject.org) and understanding the properties of merging galaxy systems with data from Galaxy Zoo (http://www.galaxyzoo.org). Some confidence in computing is a plus, as well as a familiarity with astronomy.
Detecting radio emission from the Epoch of Reionisation
Supervisor: Kris Zarb-Adami
This project involves the data analysis of LOFAR data that we are collecting from UK-Chillbolton LOFAR station. The aim of this project is to calibrate and image the data we have collected and then subtract foreground signals in order to try and find the underlying cosmological signal from the earliest stars. The data will be available by the summer, but there will also be opportunities for the student to propose further experiments and apply for time to follow-up the observations with other LOFAR stations. Whilst the student is not expected to have any experience in data analysis or reduction of radio data, it will be very helpful if the student is comfortable with programming in MATLAB.
The polarized Galaxy and inflation
Supervisor: Jo Dunkley
One of the big goals in cosmology is to detect gravitational waves, ripples in space-time that were imprinted during inflation. They leave a distinctive signature in the polarization of the Cosmic Microwave Background. However, this signal is tiny, and obscured by polarized emission from our Galaxy. Upcoming experiments plan to look at patches of sky where the Galaxy is ‘dark’. In this project you will take our best current guesses of what the Galactic foregrounds are, and investigate the optimal sky area for finding the inflationary signal. This will involve use of IDL and f90 code: running pre-written software and then making necessary modifications.
Visualising the HUDF
Supervisor:Steve Wilkins
The Hubble Ultra Deep Field (HUDF) is our most sensitive view of the Universe containing galaxies that cover 95% of the Universe's history.
The aim of this project is to develop an online tool (a preliminary version of which can be seen here: http://www.physics.ox.ac.uk/users/wilkins/outreach/iv/HUDF/) to allow members of the public to explore the HUDF.
A desire to learn / knowledge of HTML, Javascript and Python would be an advantage.
Automating the Philip Wetton Telescope
Supervisor: Fraser Clarke
The Philip Wetton telescope on the roof of the Physics building is used for public outreach, student projects and supporting research observations with other telescopes. Despite being in the middle of Oxford, the telescope enjoys surprisingly good conditions and does produce scientifically useful data. The main limitation of the telescope is finding the time to use it! To get round this, we plan to automate the observatory to enable the telescope to run unattended whenever the sky is clear.
Most of the systems to automate the observatory are already in place, and the remaining job is to tie them all together and get the system working. This varied and challenging 8 week summer project will involve some aspects of software development, electronics and mechanics. It is very much a 'hands-on' project where you will work with many different bits of hardware. You may also need to spend some time using the telescope at night to test out the system.
For more information, please contact fraser [dot] clarke [at] physics [dot] ox [dot] ac [dot] uk