Faculty
Sciences
Supervisor Name
Margaret Campbell-Brown
Keywords
Meteor Spectra, Meteoroid, High-Resolution, Diffraction Grating, Camo-S
Description
Meteoroids are often billions of years old and as they ablate and ionize in the atmosphere, they give off light leaving us clues to the history of our solar system. In addition, their presence imposes serious risks to our equipment and astronauts in space. My research deals with analyzing High-Resolution Meteor Spectra, which are obtained by separating the light Meteors give off through a Diffraction Grating. Firstly, as the Meteor’s speed during ablation affects its spectrum, the position, speed, and trajectory of 40 well-tracked Meteors (picked from over 500) were determined using the programs Metal and Mirfit. Then, the spectra of all 40 Meteors were graphed using the program Camo-S, and problems regarding frame stacking and material fittings were solved. Analyzing the results, it is determined that 25 Meteors out the 40 were from Comets and 15 were from Asteroids as shown by their respective trajectories. Moreover, it is discovered that a shift of 10-12 nm to the right is needed to transform raw spectra to its correct place. Furthermore, the location of Calcium and Sodium peaks on spectra were discovered, and a reoccurring miscellaneous peak around 450 nm was noticed. Thus, more research is needed to investigate the unknown peak, to identify the location of other elements through the known position of Ca/Na, and to investigate methods to analyze materials in Meteors without Ca/Na in the near future.
Acknowledgements
No words can express my gratitude to Dr. Campbell-Brown for taking me on as a summer student, for everything she taught me about Math, Physics, and Meteors, and for all her time devoted to helping me out with the project. Much appreciation to Michael Mazur for all his time and efforts coding and assisting me with Camo-S. Finally, shout out to Western's Meteor Physics Group for all their guidance and support, and the Western USRI Program for the funding.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 4.0 License
Document Type
Poster
Included in
Instrumentation Commons, Other Astrophysics and Astronomy Commons, Physical Processes Commons
Development of High-Resolution Meteor Spectra Analysis
Meteoroids are often billions of years old and as they ablate and ionize in the atmosphere, they give off light leaving us clues to the history of our solar system. In addition, their presence imposes serious risks to our equipment and astronauts in space. My research deals with analyzing High-Resolution Meteor Spectra, which are obtained by separating the light Meteors give off through a Diffraction Grating. Firstly, as the Meteor’s speed during ablation affects its spectrum, the position, speed, and trajectory of 40 well-tracked Meteors (picked from over 500) were determined using the programs Metal and Mirfit. Then, the spectra of all 40 Meteors were graphed using the program Camo-S, and problems regarding frame stacking and material fittings were solved. Analyzing the results, it is determined that 25 Meteors out the 40 were from Comets and 15 were from Asteroids as shown by their respective trajectories. Moreover, it is discovered that a shift of 10-12 nm to the right is needed to transform raw spectra to its correct place. Furthermore, the location of Calcium and Sodium peaks on spectra were discovered, and a reoccurring miscellaneous peak around 450 nm was noticed. Thus, more research is needed to investigate the unknown peak, to identify the location of other elements through the known position of Ca/Na, and to investigate methods to analyze materials in Meteors without Ca/Na in the near future.