2012-09-07

gravitational waves, photometry of big galaxies

Lam Hui (Columbia) gave a fun talk about various topics in our astro seminar. One point was about detection of stochastic gravitational radiation using the binary pulsar as a resonant detector. This is a great idea; the binary pulsar is sensitive at much longer periods than other detectors, and our metrology of the system is excellent. Mike Kesden (NYU) and I were confused about whether the effect he seeks really is stochastic, given the sources and the narrow-band detector. We resolved to work it out later.

Late in the day, Patel and Mykytyn updated me on the Sloan Atlas measurements. The measurements they are making look great; for many of the galaxies we are measuring these are the first reliable measurements ever from the SDSS. We discussed a bit the need and plans for checking that our photometry is correct. This is a hard thing to do; what's the absolute truth for these previously unmeasured objects?

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