Planetary Resources

[deltaV]

According to that kickstarter page the telescope is 15 kg with a 0.2 meter aperture and 1 arcsecond resolving capacity. Observations are available at three for $450 (exposure length unclear). It appears this is the telescope size they're planning to use for their asteroid prospecting missions! (http://www.planetaryresources.com/technology/)

[Robert Thompson]

According to that kickstarter page the telescope is 15 kg with a 0.2 meter aperture and 1 arcsecond resolving capacity. Observations are available at three for $450 (exposure length unclear). It appears this is the telescope size they're planning to use for their asteroid prospecting missions! (http://www.planetaryresources.com/technology/)

oooooo thank you for that. So it sounds to me: one half an orbit, 90 mins / 2 = 45 mins, for $450, or, $10 per minute usage.

[mrmandias]

I'm not real excited about 'Citizen Participation In Space!'

This demands explanation.

To the extent my psychology matters to anyone, I care about economic exploitation and settlement of space.  'Participation,' as such, doesn't matter to me.

if for some reason you want to continue this conversation, PM me.

[neilh]

I'm not real excited about 'Citizen Participation In Space!'

This demands explanation.

To the extent my psychology matters to anyone, I care about economic exploitation and settlement of space.  'Participation,' as such, doesn't matter to me.

if for some reason you want to continue this conversation, PM me.

IMHO, citizen spectation, citizen participation, and citizen exploitation of space are points along a continuum. Planetary Resources' recent work in increased citizen participation is a step which helps push things from the current citizen spectation of space to citizen exploitation.

[QuantumG]

I took the $99 level because someone else can make better use of the telescope time than me, and I love queue jumping.

HELP FIND KILLER ASTEROIDS & ALIEN GALAXIES — Help protect our planet from hazardous asteroids and better understand the evolution of our solar system.  On your behalf, we’ll give students and scientists five minutes of observation time on the ARKYD's main-optic!  Virtually join a research team as a citizen scientist contributor and receive regular updates on their research and findings! You will also receive a (Digital) HD SPACE SELFIE before all lower pledge levels. + As extra appreciation, all pledgers this level and higher will get an annual membership to The Planetary Society, the world’s largest space advocacy non-profit organization!

Also, The Planetary Society membership is worth $57, ($37 for US, $40 for Canadians).

[IanO]

The graphic under "Funding Goals" shows an Energia! I don't think the Arkyd needs quite that much launch capability.

(Another $99 in their pot. Hopefully better spent than my last backing for Cosmos-1!)

[Robert Thompson]

Hi new person. What did you make of the trolls during the chat?

I missed the chat!  How bad was the trolling?

Incidentally, I notice you're in Tucson: do you have any dealing with WIYN / Hydra?

I don't know anyone here who gets data from WIYN. My closest dealing was that Steward alum Brian Schmidt (who promised me a bottle of Maipenrai) got followup supernova data there that contributed to his Nobel Prize. Steward and LPL get no favors and have to go through the Yale TAC same as anyone.

[Tass]

According to that kickstarter page the telescope is 15 kg with a 0.2 meter aperture and 1 arcsecond resolving capacity. Observations are available at three for $450 (exposure length unclear). It appears this is the telescope size they're planning to use for their asteroid prospecting missions! (http://www.planetaryresources.com/technology/)

oooooo thank you for that. So it sounds to me: one half an orbit, 90 mins / 2 = 45 mins, for $450, or, $10 per minute usage.

"A picture" is estimated at 5 min telescope time, including both turning and exposure.

And yes, it is an Arkyd100, they plan to use a swarm of these for the initial survey, before using the upgraded 200s and 300s to look closer at the individual asteroids.

They are mass producing these already, the million is just for another one for public use. (And I guess mostly for publicity and to gauge the interest - they could have retailed time on the ones the launch anyway, without a kickstarter)

[Robert Thompson]

Tass, what I'll be waiting for is a citation of source that authoritatively pins down "picture" vs exposure time vs readout time vs flats/biases vs $/minute of telescope operation. I cannot proceed to agitate any savage undergraduate astronomy cave tribes without a $/minute.

[jebbo]

I don't know anyone here who gets data from WIYN. My closest dealing was that Steward alum Brian Schmidt (who promised me a bottle of Maipenrai) got followup supernova data there that contributed to his Nobel Prize. Steward and LPL get no favors and have to go through the Yale TAC same as anyone.

OK, just wondered as I was involved with an eclipsing binaries proposal made by the planethunters.org science team that just got time (8 nights I think). 

Still waiting to hear whether a Keck proposal (for AO and HIRES) for exoplanet confirmation has been successful . . .

On the Arkyd stuff, I think dark and bias frames should be done as part of the instrument characterisation so I doubt there's a need to do them for individual observing runs.  [ also things like point spread functions, optical characterisitics, etc, etc ]

[Tass]

Tass, what I'll be waiting for is a citation of source that authoritatively pins down "picture" vs exposure time vs readout time vs flats/biases vs $/minute of telescope operation. I cannot proceed to agitate any savage undergraduate astronomy cave tribes without a $/minute.

I'll mention it in the Vanguards facebook group. There's a good chance one of the bosses will answer it then.

For now they have only given the following specs, which are also mentioned on the kickstarter page:

Primary Optic: 200 mm aperture, f/4 primary optic
Resolving capability: ~ 1 arcsecond
Detection capability: to visual magnitude 19
5 MP+ image sensor
Wavelength range: 200 nm to 1100 nm
Available filters: UV bandpass (< 300 nm), B, V, R, OIII, Hα, 1 μm bandpass, Luminence (Clear)
Active image stabilization

Edit: In about an hour some of the leaders of planetary resources and a couple of vanguards are going to go over the assembled list of FAQs and try to answer as many as possible. I've made sure your question is mentioned, although others have made similar inquiries.

[deltaV]

I wonder whether they'll launch the telescopes as secondaries or on dedicated launchers. Presumably prototypes will go up as secondaries, but once they start mass producing them they could for example launch 500+ on a single Falcon 9 v1.1. I recall reading that secondaries are usually more expensive per kilogram than primaries, but I maybe it would be the other way around if the secondaries are purchased in bulk and aren't picky about the destination orbit. Are they going to produce the hundreds of telescopes that would be required to justify a dedicated launch?

[sublimemarsupial]

IIRC they signed up to launch on Virgin's new small satellite LV LauncherOne, which can lift ~500 lbs to LEO. With their Arkyd 100 around 30 lbs, they could put up 15 in one launch, which seems a lot more reasonable than 500+ at a single time.

[Tass]

I wonder whether they'll launch the telescopes as secondaries or on dedicated launchers. Presumably prototypes will go up as secondaries, but once they start mass producing them they could for example launch 500+ on a single Falcon 9 v1.1. I recall reading that secondaries are usually more expensive per kilogram than primaries, but I maybe it would be the other way around if the secondaries are purchased in bulk and aren't picky about the destination orbit. Are they going to produce the hundreds of telescopes that would be required to justify a dedicated launch?

They will put them up as secondaries. I doubt they are going to make as many as 500, though they are going to make a lot.

[Chris Bergin]

We've got a thread for the fundraiser, so continue there:
http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=32029.0

Tass...You signature graphic is too wide and was messing with the page format, you'll need to make it fit and not be annoying

[Tass]

Okay, sorry.

There is a smaller banner I can use, I was actually going to change to it anyway, but now I am disallowed to put img in the signature at all.

[Lar]

They are mass producing these already, the million is just for another one for public use. (And I guess mostly for publicity and to gauge the interest - they could have retailed time on the ones the launch anyway, without a kickstarter)

I did not know they were this far along... really, mass producing? How many? What launches have they procured so far?

[Tass]

They are mass producing these already, the million is just for another one for public use. (And I guess mostly for publicity and to gauge the interest - they could have retailed time on the ones they launch anyway, without a kickstarter)

I did not know they were this far along... really, mass producing? How many? What launches have they procured so far?

Well, okay, mass producing as in making more than one.

It came out wrong. I was replying to a comment saying "it appears to be the same size as those they are going to hunt for asteroids with" all I wanted to say was "It is THE same as the ones they already ARE producing to hunt for asteroids"

Sorry, while I consider myself a competent english-speaker, it is not my first language.

[Robert Thompson]

To carefully represent myself, I just finished a BS Astronomy (my second bachelors) and I'm now trying to carefully jump ships from Steward/astronomy to LPL/planetary science without falling in the drink. I've paid my Sisyphean dues on our 61" which was built to chart Apollo landing sites. I've consumed all my academic time on that instrument in part out of the romantic notion that one should fight the good fight, get your own data, reduce it, model it and gain an insight you produced 'physically' with your own hands.

I assume you're getting radial velocity at WIYN? And what's the connection between planethunters and eclipsing binaries. I only checked it for a few minutes and it looks like crowd sourced identification of transits. I could surmise that if you have good primary and secondary transits in a binary, you ~~may~~ be able to pull out timing and transit width variations caused by non-transiting planets. Wild speculation on my part.

I had to look up how often Hubble takes flats. This appears to suggest it can get by with flat fields every full moon: http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=33113

You may be right about the darks and biases. I'm only going by my training on our own 4096x4096 CCD. Applying that to the Arkyd, I figure that since the CCD isn't actively cooled, there will be a thermal cycle from 45 minutes in sun, 45 minutes in shade, unless it's heliosynchronous. And there will be nonsymmetric heating due to pointing at various targets. So thermal expansion on one side, flexure of the telescope, minute movement in the focal plane, and then contraction. Also, orbital dust getting in on CCD covers, etc, another time-changing source of error.

[Robert Thompson]

Hmmmm. Using commercial CCDs with likely aspect ratio, that could be comparable to the Olympus E1 with 2560x1920=5.1MP, or the Nikon D1x 4024x1324=5.24 MP. I figure the 1 degree FOV applies to the length and then the width is less than 1 degree. Otherwise you have to focus more, have 'faster' primary, which means more manufacturing, and they're minimizing cost. So that's one question for the FAQ - is the advertised FOV of 1 degree across the shorter width or the longer length?
http://forums.steves-digicams.com/newbie-help/31261-megapixel-ccd-size.html

And that's the first I heard the nm range. Resembles the science capability in:
http://www.skphotonics.com/pdf/la_pdf/CCD_Camera_Detector.pdf
"Each camera is calibrated in the factory after extensive thermal cycling." Ok, so no biases at the customer level. Operating temperature 0 to 40 C, so maybe it'll have to be actively heated?
I'm very glad to hear the H alpha filter. A 1 degree FOV will get all the sun, and that will be a beautiful thing. Or.... did someone say you can't point this at the sun?