2014 Annual Report - W. M. Keck Observatory · 2014 ANNUAL REPORT • W. M. KECK OBSERVATORY9 W. M....

2014 Annual Report

2 W . M . K E C K O B S E R V A T O R Y • 2 0 1 4 A N N U A L R E P O R T

VisionA world in which all humankind is inspired and united by the pursuit of knowledge of the infinite variety and richness of the Universe.

MissionTo advance the frontiers of astronomy and share our discoveries, inspiring the imagination of all.

Headquarters location: Kamuela, Hawai’i, USA

Management: California Association for Research in Astronomy

Partner Institutions: California Institute of Technology (CIT/Caltech)University of California (UC)National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)

Observatory Director: Hilton A. Lewis

Observatory Groundbreaking: 1985First light Keck I telescope: 1992First light Keck II telescope: 1996

FY2014533

Observing Astronomers

466Keck Science Programs

247 Refereed Articles

118 Full-time Employees

October 1 Fiscal Year begins

95-3972799 Federal Identification Number

Cover photo: Just before science begins, a waxing moon follows the sun below the western horizon. Credit: Ric Noyle

CARA board meeting at Caltech on November 4, 2014. Back row: Elaine Stamman, Judy Cohen, Crystal Martin, Hilton Lewis, Ted Keck, Mario Perez, Margarita Scheffel. Front row: Tom Soifer, Claire Max, Ed Stolper, George Blumenthal, Shrihivas Kularni.

2 0 1 4 A N N U A L R E P O R T • W . M . K E C K O B S E R V A T O R Y 3

Director’s Report 4

Cosmic Visionaries 9

Funding Astronomical Frontiers 10

Science Highlights 12

Keeping up with Technology 22

Education and Outreach 28

Stars Close to Home 32

Science Bibliography 34

W. M. Keck Observatory Staff looking up from headquarters in Waimea.


Aloha and welcome to the 9th edition of the W. M. Keck Observatory Annual Report. 2014 has been another highly successful year for the observatory, characterized by great science, significant upgrades to our instrumentation, the funding and development of advanced telescope instrumentation, the initial steps to developing a new Scientific Strategic Plan and a seamless transition to a new director.

On the research front, independent analysis has confirmed that Keck Observatory continues to lead as home of the two most productive ground-based optical/infrared telescopes in the world in generating peer-reviewed scientific papers as well as in the cumulative scientific impact of those papers. The observatory also leads the field of adaptive optics enabled astronomical research, with a steady upward trend in the number of papers based on this crucial technology. In fact, more than 70 percent of all laser guide-star adaptive-optics papers worldwide are generated using Keck Observatory data.

In May 2014 I took the reins, initially as Interim Director and then, following a global search by the Board of Directors, as the next Director of the Keck Observatory. My priorities are to continue the scientific excellence of the observatory through providing the most innovative and capable instrumentation and continuing the outstanding service to our astronomers for which Keck Observatory is justly renowned. All of this is predicated on attracting and retaining extraordinarily talented and creative individuals who make up our staff – a singular challenge as we compete with the most exciting research projects worldwide for mindshare, but one which I am confident we are up to. You will find many examples in this report that attest to the spirit and abilities of our team.

This past year was an exciting period for funding and constructing new instrumentation. Our next major initiative to be delivered late in 2015 is the Keck Cosmic Web Imager. KCWI is innovative and powerful, capable of studying extremely faint and diffuse objects. Its power to observe some of the most exotic phenomena in the universe will be greatly enhanced by the combination of the tremendous light grasp of the Keck II telescope and a superb site, arguably the best location in the world for ground-based astronomy. The first phase of KCWI – KCWI-Blue (optimized for the blue end of the visible spectrum) – is in final fabrication at the Caltech Institute of Technology. With significant funding from the National Science Foundation, internal observatory funds, contributions from donors and a recent generous philanthropic foundation grant, we have now received all the funds needed to complete this initial phase. In September we were thrilled to learn that the NSF had awarded an additional $4 million to fund the second phase, the KCWI Re-ionization Mapper, optimized for the red-end of the visible light spectrum. We are now embarked on a campaign to raise the remaining funds from private philanthropy. With the conclusion of the second phase in 2018, the original scientific vision for an extraordinarily capable and exciting instrument will be realized.

Design work has progressed steadily at the University of California, Santa Cruz, for another telescope innovation – the deployable tertiary – to allow us to quickly select amongst all the different instrumentation on the Keck I telescope. This will significantly increase our ability to engage in studies of transient cosmic events ranging from storms on the outer planets of our solar system to some of the most exotic phenomena in the universe such as gamma ray bursts. The deployable tertiary and the ancillary

Director’s Report

Hilton A. Lewis

... the Keck Observatory remains a remarkable testament to human ingenuity and willpower – the crown jewel of modern day astronomy.


processes we are developing place Keck Observatory on an excellent footing to take advantage of the huge new astronomical datasets coming on line from programs such as PanSTARRS, the Zwicky Transient Factory and in the next decade, the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope.

We have made significant progress in other key instrument programs as well. Two systems to improve the effectiveness and versatility of our Adaptive Optics systems were installed on the telescopes and began final testing: the Keck I AO infrared tip/tilt sensor system and the Keck II Laser Center Launch system. We received and started testing an advanced technology fiber laser that will soon replace the venerable dye laser at the heart of the Keck II AO system, now more than 15 years old. The new laser, funded in its entirety by private philanthropy, will require considerably less electricity to operate, reducing the demand from 60kW to about 1kW – a significant cost savings – all while delivering much higher laser power and performance.

And finally on the new instrumentation front, we commenced design work on a major upgrade to OSIRIS, a very powerful spectrograph used with our AO system at the University of California, Los Angeles. This upgrade will result in significantly improved sensitivity, allowing us to much more effectively study distant objects beyond our Milky Way galaxy.

We remain fully committed to stewarding the unique resource that is the Keck Observatory and are engaged in several major upgrades to address obsolescence and to take advantage of the very latest technologies to improve performance.

One of these projects is our multiyear effort – now almost complete – to upgrade the telescope control hardware and software that manage every facet of the telescopes themselves, from the interactions with users, to the safety of the facility, to the precision pointing and tracking of these 370-ton behemoths. Just as important is the renewal program for the 84 primary mirror segments that make up the two 10-meter primary mirrors – the core of the telescopes. We are

Director’s Report

Hilton A. Lewis

Observatory Council members from left to right: Bill Brown, Rich Matsuda, Debbie Goodwin, Bob Goodrich, Peter Wizinowich, Kevin McCann. Credit: Ric Noyle

engaged in a complex, multiyear program to rebuild the original precision hardware that supports the 1-ton segments.

Operations are the unsung hero of the Keck Observatory experience – the day-in, day-out effort by the majority of our staff to ensure that astronomers can squeeze every last bit of performance out of the facility. Ensuring that the telescopes and their instruments are operational every single night of the year is no mean feat – the time available to work on them is only around six hours per day, at the end of which all systems must be operating perfectly. And this must be accomplished at the same time as routine maintenance, equipment upgrades and the installation of new capabilities. I am proud to say that our staff has proven up to the challenge.

What of the future? Important new ground and space astronomical capabilities are slated to start science operations in this decade, such as the NASA James Webb Space Telescope. In the middle of the next decade, powerful additional capabilities like the Thirty Meter Telescope, the European Extremely Large Telescope, the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope and NASA’s

The unsung hero of the Keck Observatory experience is the day-in, day-out effort by the majority of our staff to ensure that astronomers can wring the utmost out of the telescopes.


WFIRST mission will come online. These enormously expensive programs are well beyond typical university and even national programs and demand new multinational partnerships. It is clear the entire ecosystem of ground-based astronomy is undergoing a fundamental change.

At the same time, the Keck Observatory has itself evolved into a national and to some extent international facility. Motivated by this evolving scientific landscape, we held a strategic planning workshop in September to define a comprehensive and competitive Scientific Strategic Plan for the next decade:

a plan that will guide our investments in instrumentation, systems, partnerships and people; a plan to ensure Keck Observatory will continue to play a leading role in astronomy far into the future.

I commend this Annual Report to you – read about the exciting work that is being done and the people who make it all possible. And at the conclusion, I think you will agree with me that the Keck Observatory remains a remarkable testament to human ingenuity and willpower – one of the crown jewels of modern day astronomy.

Facing page: Members of the Summit Day Crew climb aloft the mighty Keck II to ensure safe operation of the shutters. Credit: Ric NoyleBelow: Members of the Segment Refresh Team test the system that safely transports the segment to the repair facility at HQ. Credit: Ric Noyle

Keck Observatory has evolved into a national, and to some extent international, facility.


W. M. Keck ObservatoryBoard of DirectorsEdward Stolper, Chair Provost, California Institute of TechnologyGeorge Blumenthal, Vice-Chair Chancellor, University of California at Santa CruzAimée Dorr Provost & Executive Vice President, University of California Academic AffairsHashima Hasan, liaison Scientist, National Aeronautics and Space Administration Günther Hasinger, liaison Director, Institute for Astronomy, University of HawaiiTheodore J. Keck, liaison Director, W. M. Keck Foundation Shrinivas Kulkarni Director, Optical Observatories, California Institute of TechnologyClaire Max Interim Director, University of California/Lick ObservatoriesThomas Soifer Division Chair, Physics, Mathematics & Astronomy, California Institute of Technology

Lynne HillenbrandLisa Kewley, non-voting memberAnne KinneyShrinivas Kulkarni, ex-officioMichael Liu, non-voting member Christopher MartinClaire Max, ex-officioJerry Nelson, ex-officio

Judith Cohen, Co-ChairCrystal Martin, Co-Chair Charles BeichmanDuncan Forbes, non-voting memberMarla Geha, non-voting memberAndrea GhezJames GrahamGünther Hasinger, non-voting member

Keck ObservatoryScience Steering Committee

Cosmic VisionariesThe governing board of the W. M. Keck Observatory consists of representatives from our founding partners: the California Institute of Technology and the University of California. In addition, NASA and the W. M. Keck Foundation each have liaisons to the Board of Directors. The Keck Observatory Director and the Board are

advised by a Science Steering Committee that includes leading astronomers from our partner communities. Keck Observatory’s Advancement program is guided by an esteemed volunteer leadership council whose members contribute both their expertise and their philanthropy to ensure Keck Observatory’s continued success.

Keck Observatory Advancement Advisory CouncilSanford Robertson, Chair, and Jeanne RobertsonClive Davies, Vice-Chair, and Carol Davies

Marc and Lynne BenioffRobert and Susan FischellC. Wallace and Bobbie Jean HooserGary and Pam JaffeShrinivas Kulkarni, ex-officioHilton Lewis, ex-officio

Claire Max, ex-officioGordon and Betty MooreJohn and Anne RyanRob and Terry RyanDoug and Deborah Troxel

Maui’s Haleakala rises gently out of the Pacific after sunset. Credit: Andrew Hara


From the revolutionary design of our segmented, primary mirrors to the tour de force capital grants that built our world-leading astronomy facility, the W. M. Keck Observatory’s very beginnings shaped a clear commitment to consistently deliver high-risk, high-reward research. Keck Observatory’s funders, scientists and engineers have sustained this intention over the lifetime of the organization, inspiring a global constituency with breakthrough astronomy discoveries and world leading astro-technologies. Our entrepreneurial spirit has strengthened over time, garnering the necessary resources to fulfill ambitious goals from federal grants, private philanthropy and other strategic partnerships.

Keck Observatory was made possible by the generosity of the W. M. Keck Foundation

Funding Astronomical Frontiersin the 1980s. The Los Angeles-based foundation awarded two capital grants totaling almost $140 million. At the time, this was the largest, single investment given to science from private philanthropy. The grants paid for the costs of building the observatory, its headquarters in Waimea, and its initial adaptive-optics system.

In addition to the foundation’s transformative philanthropy, Keck Observatory also was distinctive as an astronomy research facility in being formed as a tax-exempt, private, nonprofit organization through a unique partnership between its founding academic institutions, the California Institute of Technology and the University of California. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration joined as a one-sixth partner in the observatory in 1996. While this federal agency traditionally funds space-based

The Keck I telescope pointing near the horizon, getting ready for another night of science.Credit: Ric Noyle

Public Funding Sources in 2014

Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy

Jet Propulsion Laboratory

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

National Science Foundation

University of California

missions, NASA realized the enormous gains in space exploration to be made by access to Keck Observatory and continues to value this access through a five-year cooperative agreement renewed in 2013.

In the original founding documents to establish the California Association for Research in Astronomy, the management entity of the Keck Observatory, the Board of Directors is made up of representatives from Caltech and UC, and the 501(c)(3) is guaranteed operating support annually. This support was $14.2 million in 2014 and covered basic operations and maintenance costs for the summit and headquarters facilities. NASA contributed an additional $3.7 million for operations and the Keck Observatory data archive. In 2014 the National Science Foundation awarded a grant of $4 million towards the development of the observatory’s next breakthrough instrument, the Cosmic Web Imager. To strengthen its resource base, the observatory in recent years established strategic partnerships with Yale University and the Australia National University. In 2014, these academic institutions contributed more than $1.7 million to support Keck Observatory’s operations funding. In addition, the observatory received a subaward of $40,000 from the University of California at Los Angeles this past year in support of our adaptive optics program.

In 2005, the Keck Observatory Board of Directors established an advancement program to attract additional philanthropic support. Over the past ten years the observatory’s advancement department has pursued many approaches to building community support and deepening public engagement in its work.

Since 2005, Friends of the Keck Observatory have provided funding for five instrument projects in Keck’s arsenal of instrumentation: the Multi-Object Spectrograph for Infrared Exploration (MOSFIRE), the Low Resolution Imaging Spectrograph Red (LRIS-R) upgrade, the Keck I Laser Guide Star Adaptive Optics (LGS AO) laser system, the Keck II Center Launch system for LGS AO, and the Multi-function Acquisition, Guiding and Image Quality (MAGIQ) monitoring system for our premier planet hunting instrument, High Resolution Echelle Spectrometer (HIRES). Private philanthropy has completely funded the next-generation laser currently in development for the Keck II telescope. Gifts and grants are now being directed to support the observatory’s next instrument, the Cosmic Web Imager. In 2014, a total of $723,000 was raised in new gifts from Friends of the Keck Observatory.

The total budget for the Keck Observatory for 2015 is $27.5 million. Audited financial statements are available upon request or directly from the observatory’s website.

The Evenings with Astronomers series is a very successful event that brings the world’s leading astronomers together with patrons of science under the tropical Hawaiian night sky. 2014 was the 10th season for these events. Credit: Ethan Tweedie


Science HighlightsQuestion: Where does an 800-pound gorilla sit? Answer: Anywhere it wants.

Question: What does a massive 10m telescope on the summit of Mauna Kea observe? Answer: Anything it wants.

The mighty Keck telescopes observe objects near and far, large and small. In astronomy, when we observe distant galaxies and structures, we need a large “light bucket” to capture their tenuous light. And we can’t travel to closely inspect anything outside of our own Solar System. Since first light in 1992, the mighty 10-meter mirrors of Keck Observatory, combined with its adaptive systems, sharpens our vision of distant worlds both in our own neighborhood and planets outside the solar system, as well of the very edge of the viewable Universe.

In this review of Keck Observatory’s contributions over the past year, we report on studies of the largest structures in the Universe, and describe how galaxies formed in the early Universe. We also report on a mainstay of Keck Observatory research: the ongoing search for Earth-like planets.

Keck I & II working busily, each with their laser guide-star adaptive-optics systems eliminating the effects of distortion from the Earth’s atmosphere. Credit: Andrew Hara


Computer simulations suggest matter in the Universe is distributed in a “cosmic web” of filaments, as seen in the image above from a large-scale, dark-matter simulation (Bolshoi simulation, by Anatoly Klypin and Joel Primack). The inset is a zoomed-in, high-resolution image of a smaller part of the cosmic web, 10 million light-years across, from a simulation that includes gas as well as dark matter. The intense radiation from a quasar can, like a flashlight, illuminate part of the surrounding cosmic web (highlighted in the image) and make a filament of gas glow, as was observed in the case of quasar UM287.

Credit: S. Cantalupo (UCSC); J. Primack (UCSC); A. Klypin (NMSU)

First Cosmic Web FilamentsUnbeknownst to most, the largest structures in the Universe form what is called the “cosmic web.” This network of filaments of gas and dark matter provides the material from which galaxies, stars and their planets are formed. But the cosmic web is incredibly faint, making detection difficult with existing instruments. This is a major driver behind construction of the new KCWI instrument — the Keck Cosmic Web Imager — being built to reveal the web and many other large and complex objects. Meanwhile, impatient and clever astronomers have already used existing Keck Observatory capabilities and novel techniques to obtain the first glimpses of it.

In the early days of the Universe, the galaxies were much closer together than the isolated grand spirals and ellipticals of the current day. Gravitationally jostling each other, they collided and merged, forming fewer but more massive galaxies in the process. All of the matter raining down on these primitive galaxies triggered huge bursts of star formation. How did this initial chaotic violence evolve into the more stately structures we see today? This is one of the important questions Keck scientists are studying today.

Researchers at University of California, Santa Clara led by Sebastiano Cantalupo, used distant quasars to see if any were lighting up gas around the cosmic web and discovered a large, luminous nebula of gas extending 2 million light-years across intergalactic space.

This work was selected by Physics World editors as one of the top 10 breakthroughs in physics in 2014, and was featured in the “Year in Science” issue of Discover magazine.

“This is a very exceptional object: It’s huge, at least twice as large as any nebula detected before, and it extends well beyond the galactic environment of the quasar,” said Cantalupo in the news released on Keck Observatory’s website on January 19, 2014.

“This quasar is illuminating diffuse gas on scales well beyond any we’ve seen before, giving us the first picture of extended gas between galaxies,” said J. Xavier Prochaska, co-author and professor of astronomy and astrophysics at UCSC. “It provides a terrific insight into the overall structure of our Universe.”

The team discovered that the hydrogen gas illuminated by the quasar was emitting ultraviolet light known as Lyman alpha radiation. The distance to the quasar is so great (about 10 billion light-years) that the emitted light is “stretched” by the expansion of the Universe from an invisible ultraviolet wavelength to a visible shade of violet by the time it reached the Keck I telescope and the LRIS — Low Resolution Imaging Spectrometer — used for gathering the data for this discovery. Knowing the distance to the quasar, the researchers calculated the wavelength for Lyman alpha radiation and built a special filter to isolate that wavelength.

“We have studied other quasars this way without detecting such extended gas,” Cantalupo said. “The light from the quasar is like a flashlight beam, and in this case we were lucky that the flashlight is pointing toward the nebula and making the gas glow. We think this is part of a filament that may be even more extended than this, but we only see the part of the filament that is illuminated by the beamed emission from the quasar.”

This technique of looking for hydrogen emission from the cosmic web is relatively new, but for many years astronomers have been using quasars as background light sources, and looking for the absorption of light by gas between the quasar and us. The next article demonstrates the technique and another discovery made in 2014.

This deep image shows a piece of the cosmic web (cyan) extending 2 million light-years from the bright quasar UM287 (at the center of the image). The energetic radiation of the quasar makes the surrounding intergalactic gas glow.

Credit: S. Cantalupo (UCSC)


Image of a galaxy (center) with inflowing cold gas produced by rendering the gas distribution in a supercomputer simulation of a forming galaxy. A distant quasar (lower left; quasar added by an artist, along with the starry background) illuminates from behind a stream of primordial gases. Researchers led by Neil Crighton (MPIA and Swinburne University of Technology) now have made the first unambiguous detection of this accretion of pristine gas onto a star-forming galaxy. The simulation shown here was run by the Making Galaxies in a Cosmological Context — MaGICC — project in the theory group at MPIA.

Credit: MPIA (G. Stinson and A.V. Macciò)

Fueling a Primordial Galaxy Within the cosmic web, gas funnels onto galaxies along thin “cold streams” that, like streams of snow melt feeding a mountain lake, channel cool gas from the surrounding intergalactic medium onto galaxies, continuously topping off their supplies of raw material for star formation.

This primordial gas is of great interest to scientists, giving insight into the formation of galaxies and eventually planets.

Neil Crighton, of the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy (MPIA), and his team found the best evidence to date for a flow of pristine intergalactic gas onto a galaxy called Q1442-MD50. The galaxy is so distant that it took 11 billion years for its light to reach the LRIS instrument fitted on the Keck I telescope.

The in-falling gas resides a mere 190,000 light-years from the galaxy — relatively nearby on galactic length-scales — and was revealed

in silhouette in the absorption spectrum of the more distant background quasar, QSO J1444535+291905. Crighton’s team used background quasars as light sources and searched for spectral signatures of intervening gas flows from foreground galaxies.

The gas they observed is thought to be pristine because it contains deuterium, a stable isotope of hydrogen that is easily destroyed in the stars.

“This is not the first time astronomers have found a galaxy with nearby gas revealed by a quasar. But it is the first time that everything fits together,” Crighton said in the October 2, 2013 news release. “The galaxy is vigorously forming stars, and the gas properties clearly show that this is pristine material, left over from the early Universe shortly after the Big Bang.”

“This discovery is the result of a systematic search, so we can now deduce that such cold flows are quite common,” said Joseph Hemmai, also of MPIA. “We only had to search 12 quasar-galaxy pairs to discover this example. This rate is in rough agreement with the predictions of supercomputer simulations.”

As the cold gas falls into the cores of primordial galaxies, it triggers massive bouts of star formation. Finding these primordial galaxies is challenging as the new stars rapidly produce and expel dust that quickly hides them from view. And the largest galaxies are rare beasts, requiring extensive searches across large swaths of sky, as evidenced in the next discovery.


Telescope Science InstituteArtist’s view of the formation of a dense galaxy core. Massive young stars are forming from dense accumulations of gas and dust, shining at blue wavelengths. Gas surrounding many of the stars glows red.

Credit: NASA/ESA; Space

Monster Galaxy Formation After years of searching, Yale University astronomers discovered what they had been searching for: a turbulent, star-bursting galactic core forming millions of stars at a ferocious rate, and observed it as it was just 3 billion years after the Big Bang.

Galaxy formation theories have long suggested that monster elliptical galaxies form from the inside out, creating their dramatically star-studded central cores during early cosmic epochs. The August 27, 2014 news release reported on the first time scientists had ever been able to observe this core construction.

Only the most powerful telescopes have the ability to look back far enough to gather this important insight. “It’s a formation process that can’t happen anymore,” said Erica Nelson, Yale graduate student and lead author of the paper. “The early Universe could make these galaxies, but the modern Universe can’t. It was this hotter, more turbulent place — these were boiling cauldrons forging stars.”

The team estimated that Sparky — the informal name for the GOODS-N-774 galaxy — produces 300 stars per year. By comparison, the Milky Way produces only 10 stars per year. While the tiny galaxy is only 6 percent the physical size of the Milky Way, it already contains about twice as many stars.

NIRSPEC — Near-Infrared SPECtrograph — installed on Keck II, also revealed to the team that the galaxy boasts the most rapidly orbiting gas clouds ever measured, the most definitive evidence that they were witnessing the core of a monster galaxy in formation.

“It's pretty rare to be at the telescope and know that you are getting something pretty striking,” Pieter van Dokkum, Professor of Astronomy at Yale University, said of the night the data was gathered. “We could quickly see the signature we were looking for and could just tell it was going to be something spectacular.”

Sparky may have a lot of company. “We suspect there are a 100 times as many and we’re just missing them,” Nelson said.

Like finding primordial gas, looking back to the beginning of galaxy formation provides enormous insight into why things are the way they are. And to observe the very first galaxies in the Universe, Keck Observatory must push back to great distance, and hence time. The observatory’s newest instrument, MOSFIRE, has become a premiere and important research tool in the study of distant galaxies, recently setting a record for the most distant galaxy known. Rather than studying the rare, massive galaxies as the Yale astronomers did, this discovery provides a window into the formation of galaxies similar to our own Milky Way.

This image shows observations of a newly discovered galaxy core dubbed GOODS-N-774, taken by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope’s Wide Field Camera 3 and Advanced Camera for Surveys. The core is marked by the box inset, overlaid on a section of the Hubble GOODS-N, or GOODS North field (Great Observatories Origins Deep Survey).

Credit: NASA/ESA


This image from the HST CANDELS survey highlights the most distant galaxy in the Universe with a measured distance, dubbed z8_GND_5296. The galaxy’s red color alerted astronomers that it likely is extremely far away, and thus seen at an early time after the Big Bang. A team of astronomers led by Steven Finkelstein of The University of Texas at Austin measured the exact distance using Keck I’s new MOSFIRE instrument. The galaxy is seen at about 700 million years after the Big Bang, when the Universe was just 5 percent of its current age of 13.8 billion years.

Credit: V. Tilvi, S.L. Finkelstein, C. Papovich, A. Koekemoer, CANDELS, and STScI/NASA

An artist’s rendition of the newly discovered, most distant galaxy z8_GND_5296. (The galaxy looks red in the actual HST image because the collective blue light from stars gets shifted toward redder colors due to the expansion of the Universe and its great distance from Earth.)

Credit: V. Tilvi, S.L. Finkelstein, C. Papovich, and the

Hubble Heritage Team

The Most Distant Known GalaxyThe University of Texas at Austin astronomer Steven Finkelstein and his team discovered and measured the distance to this most distant galaxy, seeing it as it was a mere 700 million years after the Big Bang.

While many telescopes can identify candidates for galaxies in the early Universe, spectroscopic observations are necessary to confirm their true distances. MOSFIRE is the ideal instrument for this, allowing astronomers to observe up to 46 galaxies (or other objects) simultaneously and in the near-infrared, where spectral features can reveal each galaxy’s distance.

In this case, MOSFIRE, fitted on Keck I, measured the redshift of z8_GND_5296 as 7.51, the highest galaxy redshift ever confirmed. The team also found the galaxy is forming stars 150 times faster than our own Milky Way galaxy.

What makes this distance so exciting is, “We get a glimpse of conditions when the Universe was only about 700 million years old, or about 5 percent of its current age of 13.8 billion years,” said Casey Papovich of Texas A&M University, second author of the study, which was published on October 23, 2013.

“We want to study very distant galaxies to learn how they change with time,” Finkelstein said. “This helps us understand how the Milky Way came to be.”

MOSFIRE made the measurement possible, Finkelstein said. “The instrument is great. Not only is it sensitive, it can look at multiple objects at a time,” he said, which allowed his team to observe 43 galaxies in only two nights at Keck Observatory, and obtain the highest quality observations possible.

We leave behind the heady realm of the cosmic web and early galaxy formation to check on progress in understanding exoplanets, a field pioneered in great part by Keck Observatory its scientists.


The Search for Earth 2.0Since man first discovered planets orbiting other stars, the obvious question became, “How many Earth-sized planets are there?” Now that 1,000 exoplanets have been confirmed, astronomers have turned their attention to those most likely to harbor life. To answer this question, we first look at what we know, using Earth as a likely progenitor model for life.

Specifically, scientists are looking for Earth-like planets: small, rocky planets that live within the so-called “habitable zone” around a star. The habitable zone is the range of distances from the star where water can be expected to be in liquid form.

One in Five Stars Has An Earth-sized Planet in Its Habitable ZoneOn November 4, 2103, scientists from University of California, Berkeley, and University of Hawaii at Manoa, answered the primary mission question of NASA’s Kepler mission: “To discover dozens of Earth-size planets in or near the habitable zone and determine how many of the billions of stars in our galaxy have such planets.”

Using the HIRES instrument installed on the Keck I telescope, the team statistically determined that 20 percent of Sun-like stars in our galaxy have Earth-sized planets that could host life. The findings were gleaned from data collected from Keck Observatory and NASA’s Kepler spacecraft.

“When you look up at the thousands of stars in the night sky, the nearest sun-like star with an Earth-sized planet in its habitable zone is probably only 12 light-years away and can be seen with the naked eye,” said UC Berkeley graduate student Erik Petigura, who led the analysis. “That is amazing.” Even more astonishing is the calculation of how many such planets live in our galaxy, estimated at 40 billion.

“For NASA, this number — every fifth star has a planet somewhat like Earth — is important because successor missions to Kepler will try to take an actual picture of a planet, and the size of the telescope they have to build depends on how close the nearest Earth-sized planets are,” said Andrew Howard, astronomer with the Institute for Astronomy at the University of Hawaii. “An abundance of planets orbiting nearby stars simplifies such follow-up missions.”

The team, which also included planet hunter Geoffrey Marcy, UC Berkeley professor of astronomy, cautioned that Earth-sized planets in Earth-sized orbits are not necessarily hospitable to life, even if they orbit in the habitable zone.

“Some may have thick atmospheres, making it so hot at the surface that DNA-like molecules would not survive. Others may have rocky surfaces that could harbor liquid water suitable for living organisms,” Marcy said. “We don't know what range of planet types and their environments are suitable for life.”

First Earth-Sized, Rocky Exoplanet FoundIn a related research project designed to find potential life-bearing planets, a team of astronomers found the first Earth-sized and Earth-like planet outside the solar system meaning, it had a rocky composition like that of Earth. They reported their finding on October 20, 2013. Known as Kepler-78b, this exoplanet orbits its star every 8.5 hours, making it much too hot to support life.

Artist’s representation of the “habitable zone,” the range of orbits where liquid water is permitted on the surface of a planet. Petigura’s team finds that 22% ± 8% of Sun-like stars harbor a planet between one and two times the size of Earth in the habitable zone.

Credit: Petigura (UC Berkeley), Howard (UH-Manoa), Marcy (UC Berkeley)

Analysis of four years of precision measurements from Kepler shows that 22% ± 8% of Sun-like stars have Earth-sized planets in the habitable zone. If these planets are as prevalent locally as they are in the Kepler field, then the distance to the nearest one is around 12 light-years.

Credit: Petigura (UC Berkeley), Howard (UH-Manoa), Marcy (UC Berkeley)

Artist impression of a rocky and water-rich asteroid being torn apart by the strong gravity of the white dwarf star GD 61. Similar objects in the Solar System likely delivered the bulk of water on Earth and represent the building blocks of the terrestrial planets.

Credit: Mark A. Garlick (space-art.co.uk), University of Warwick and

University of Cambridge.


The team, led by Dr. Andrew Howard of the Institute for Astronomy, University of Hawaii at Manoa, measured the mass of the planet using the Keck I telescope with HIRES installed.

With a radius 1.2 times that of the Earth and a mass 1.7 times the Earth’s, Kepler-78b has a density the same as Earth’s, suggesting that it also is made primarily of rock and iron. Its star is slightly smaller and less massive than the Sun and is located about 400 light-years from Earth in the constellation Cygnus.

Watery Asteroid Discovered in Dying Star Points to Habitable ExoplanetsFinding an Earth-like planet in a habitable zone is one thing, but finding one with water on its surface would be most interesting.

Proving water’s existence on a planet remains an elusive and difficult goal, requiring a coincidence of a recent impact of a small body like an asteroid or comet, a stellar surface that is calm and stable, and the high spectral resolving power of HIRES on Keck I.

Astronomers at the universities of Cambridge and Warwick published evidence on October 10, 2013, demonstrating that asteroids around at least one other star contain a significant amount of water, stating this is the first “reliable evidence” for water-rich, rocky planetary material in any extrasolar planetary system.

White dwarfs are the evolutionary end points of Sun-like stars, the nearly exhausted embers, the stellar cores. They have nearly pristine surfaces, consisting of almost pure hydrogen and helium. Against this simple background, in-falling gas and dust can be seen, giving clues to the composition of the planetary system surrounding the star. In the case of the white dwarf GD 61, astronomers found the shattered remains of an asteroid that apparently contained huge amounts of water. GD 61 and its planetary system have the potential to contain Earth-like exoplanets.

The asteroid analyzed by the team is at least 90 km in size and possibly much larger and is composed of 26 percent water mass, similar to Ceres, the largest asteroid in the main belt of our solar system. Both are vastly more water-rich than the Earth.

Earth is essentially a “dry” planet, with only 0.02 percent of its mass as surface water, meaning oceans came long after it had formed, most likely when water-rich asteroids in the solar system crashed into our planet.

The research team, led by Cambridge’s Institute of Astronomy’s Jay Farihi, describes it as a “look into our future.” Six billion years from now, alien astronomers studying the rocky remains around our burned out sun might reach the same conclusion: terrestrial planets once circled our parent star.

“These water-rich building blocks, and the terrestrial planets they build, may in fact be common — a system cannot create things as big as asteroids and avoid building planets, and GD 61 had the ingredients to deliver lots of water

to their surfaces,” Farihi said. “Our results demonstrate that there was definitely potential for habitable planets in this exoplanetary system.”

This debris was chemically analyzed using HIRES on Keck I to detect a range of elemental abundances in the white dwarf’s contaminated atmosphere, including magnesium, silicon and iron, which, together with oxygen, are the main components of rocks.

After sifting through the data, “We knew we were looking at a rocky asteroid with substantial water content — perhaps in the form of subsurface ice — like the asteroids we know in our solar system such as Ceres,” said Boris Gänsicke from the University of Warwick.

Artist impression of the planet Kepler-78b and its host star.

Credit: Karen Teramura (UH/IfA)

Images of Io obtained at different infrared wavelengths (in microns, μm, or millionths of a meter) with Keck II on Aug. 15, 2013 (a-c) and the Gemini North telescope on Aug. 29, 2013 (d). Credit: Imke de Pater and Katherine de Kleer (UC Berkeley)


Massive Eruptions on Jupiter’s Moon IoWe end our tour of Keck science from the past year with dessert: some dramatic results from our own neighborhood of the Universe that were published on August 4, 2014.

Our own Solar System continues to provide surprises revealed by Keck Observatory’s adaptive-optics systems. Within a two-week period, astronomers using Keck and Gemini observatories observed three massive volcanic eruptions occurring on Jupiter’s moon Io. The researchers speculated that these presumed rare “outbursts,” which can send material hundreds of miles above the surface, might be much more common than previously thought.

“We typically expect one huge outburst every one or two years, and they’re usually not this bright,” said Imke de Pater, professor and chair of astronomy at the University of California, Berkeley, and lead author of one of two papers describing the eruptions. “Here we had three extremely bright outbursts, which suggest if we looked more frequently, we might see many more of them on Io.”

Io, the innermost of Jupiter's four large Galilean moons, is about 2,300 miles across, and, aside from Earth, is the only known place in the solar system with volcanoes erupting extremely hot lava like that seen on Earth. Because of Io’s low gravity, large volcanic eruptions produce an umbrella of debris that rises high above its surface, even feeding a torus of molecules that orbit Jupiter in the plane of Io’s orbit.

De Pater’s long-time colleague and co-author Ashley Davies, a volcanologist with NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, said the recent eruptions resemble past events that spewed tens of cubic miles of lava over hundreds of square miles in a short period of time.

“These new events are in a relatively rare class of eruptions on Io because of their size and astonishingly high thermal emission,” he said. “The amount of energy being emitted by these eruptions implies lava fountains gushing out of fissures at a very large volume per second, forming lava flows that quickly spread over the surface of Io.”

All three events, including the largest, most powerful eruption of the trio on Aug. 29, 2013, were likely characterized by “curtains of fire,” as lava blasted out of fissures perhaps several miles long.

De Pater discovered the first two massive eruptions on Aug. 15, 2013, using NIRC2 behind Keck II’s AO system. The brightest, at a caldera named Rarog Patera, was calculated to have produced a 50-square-mile, 30-foot-thick lava flow, while the other, close to another caldera called Heno Patera, produced flows covering 120 square miles. Both were nearly gone when imaged five days later.

“We are looking at several cubic miles of lava in rapidly emplaced flows,” said Davies, who has developed models to predict the volume of magma erupted based on spectroscopic observations. “This will help us understand the processes that helped shape the surfaces of all the terrestrial planets, including Earth and the Moon.”

Volcanoes were first noted on Io in 1979, and subsequent studies by the Galileo spacecraft, which first flew by Io in 1996, and ground-based telescopes show that eruptions and lava fountains occur constantly, creating rivers and lakes of lava. But large eruptions, creating vast lava flows, in some cases thousands of square miles in area, were thought to be rare. Only 13 were observed between 1978 and 2006, in part because only a handful of astronomers, de Pater among them, regularly scan the moon.

The team hopes that monitoring Io’s surface annually will reveal the style of volcanic eruptions on the moon, constrain the composition of the magma, and accurately map the spatial distribution of the heat flow and potential variations over time. This information is essential to a better understanding of the physical processes involved in the heating and cooling processes on Io, de Pater said.

From our Solar System to the farthest galaxy known, Keck Observatory continues to provide astronomers with the tools and opportunities to continue to make breakthroughs along many fronts in astronomy. The gorillas remain on the forefront of scientific discovery, wherever they decide to sit.

A comprehensive maintenance program and a dedicated operations team keep 226 mechanical systems with 1,894 pieces of equipment running strong. And the team’s combined 75-plus years of summit-only experience is key to ensuring that Keck Observatory doesn’t just keep going, but stays on the bleeding-edge of technology advancements.

In 2014, Keck Observatory’s professional staff once again outdid themselves — upgrading and implementing technology that supercharged observation power, saved money on energy costs, improved computer performance and more. In this report we look at progress made on key projects that continue to advance Keck Observatory’s capabilities.

Under ControlThe multiyear initiative to upgrade the telescope control system — TCS — saw significant progress in FY 2014.

The TCS provides drive and position/velocity sensing for telescope azimuth axes, elevation axes, the secondary mirror and for the telescope dome. The system optimizes focus and optical alignment and keeps the dome shutter opening aligned with the telescope aperture as the equipment is moved. The TCS also controls the

Cassegrain instrument rotators, the facility rotators on the bent Cassegrain ports, and the rotators on the Nasmyth platform instruments – critical components to allow the telescope to tracks objects billions of light-years away.

These recent upgrades address former limitations, particularly the open loop pointing, tracking performance and the maximum slew rate, all of which were below specification.

“Originally commissioned 20 years ago, the TCS system had performance limitations,” said Bob Goodrich, Keck Observatory project scientist in charge of the TCS upgrade. “It also was getting difficult to maintain. More modern technologies were available, and we were losing enough telescope time to problems with the system that we felt it was time to upgrade it with something that would work better for us.”

Those upgrades included eliminating obsolete components and replacing select components for improved performance, reliability and maintainability — all while using as much of the existing TCS hardware and software as possible.

One key upgrade made was the replacement of the telescope’s azimuth and elevation encoder systems. The old encoder system, while effective, had limitations. If the encoder

The observatory’s mechanical systems have run continuously 365 days a year for 24 years.

Previous spread: The Keck Summit Crew proudly poses between Keck I & Keck II, the largest and most scientifically productive telescopes on earth.

Credit: Ric Noyle


Keeping Up With TechnologyAn inside look at some of the technology that makes the W. M. Keck Observatory

home to the most scientifically productive telescopes on Earth

From far left: TCSU Team: Shui Kwok, Ean James, Jimmy Johnson, Tomas Krasuski. Robert Novak and Paul Stomski in front of TBAD. Credit: Ric Noyle

The Ko’a Heiau Holomoana on the western slope of Kohala Mountain is thought to be an observatory for spotting other islands of Polynesia. The Polynesian wayfinders are commonly regarded as the greatest of navigators. Credit: Mark Devenot

wheel slipped and the encoder no longer fairly represented the telescope position then it would only recalibrate when the telescope passed a known absolute position. The new system addresses this limitation by using an encoder tape that is constantly read and always knows where the telescope structure itself is pointing.

“The new system will allow us to achieve extremely high pointing accuracy anywhere in the sky,” Goodrich said.

The Keck II telescope is undergoing those upgrades first, with completion expected in early 2015. Similar upgrades to Keck I will follow with anticipated completion in FY 2016.

Here Comes The SunIn 2014, the W. M. Keck Observatory had its moment in the sun. A five-month project to upgrade the observatory’s energy efficiency using solar power was completed in

February. Spearheaded by Keck Observatory operations engineering manager Thomas Nordin, the project will save the observatory significant electricity costs and position Keck Observatory as a leader in alternative energy within the U.S. astronomy landscape.

The 120kW solar array consists of 696 photovoltaic solar panels installed at two locations, one at Keck Observatory headquarters and the other at the visiting-scientists quarters.

“The system will pay for itself in eight years,” said Nordin. “The anticipated life of the PV system is at least 20 years, providing the observatory with at least 12 years of free electricity — freeing up resources for other important projects at Keck Observatory.”

Between February 1 and September 30, 2014, the headquarters’ PV system produced more than 211,000 kWh, saving Keck Observatory $75,000 and preventing 281,000 pounds of carbon dioxide from


being released into the atmosphere. The visiting-scientists quarters has seen similar success, producing 35,186 kWh, saving $12,000 and preventing 47,000 pounds of carbon dioxide release.

In considering the switch to solar, other alternative energy sources were evaluated.

“We considered wind energy and performed a 16-month study logging wind data from a tower near the front office,” Nordin said. “Ultimately, it was decided that PV was the most cost-effective solution.”

“Waimea is surprisingly sunny,” Nordin noted. “And the frequent, light afternoon rains help keep the solar panels clean and cool, which improves their efficiency.”

In addition to the PV panel installations, engineers are working to upgrade Keck Observatory’s energy efficiency in other ways over the coming year. Headquarters has been outfitted with energy efficient lamps, and computer platforms are due for an upgrade to ones that conserve more electricity. When air conditioners come up for replacement, they’re being switched out with high-efficiency units. Pumps and fans on the summit are being outfitted with variable speed drives to reduce energy consumption.

The future of Keck Observatory’s energy-efficiency efforts are bright indeed.

Better Optics, Better ObservationsAdaptive Optics has been in use at the Keck Observatory since 2004. AO systems allow astronomers to better observe the light of distant stars while removing the disturbances introduced by Earth’s atmosphere. This is an area known as high-angular resolution astronomy, in which Keck Observatory dominates.

“The turbulence in the Earth’s atmosphere produces distortion of the light that comes into our telescope,” said Sean Adkins, instrument program manager at Keck Observatory. “We significantly reduce its affects with our adaptive-optics systems.”

In 2014, the adaptive-optics team, led by Peter Wizinowich, continued upgrades to the AO systems to make the observations of both telescopes even more accurate. That’s a big win, as AO is increasingly used by the observing community: 37 percent of refereed science papers published since April 2014 is based on AO observations.

Top: Tod von Boeckmann inspecting a segment.Middle: Ed Wetherell and Scott Lilley adjusting and validating a new Laser.Bottom: Josie Ward and Denny Birch building the summit cluster for visualization.

Credits: Ric Noyle

A major improvement to the Keck II AO system is the implementation of a near-infrared, tip-tilt sensor. Many stars shine brighter in the infrared spectrum than in the visual spectrum. Both Keck Observatory AO systems rely on guide stars to determine atmospheric tip-tilt. With an IR tip-tilt sensor, these systems can access far more guide stars to correct atmospheric distortions in a much larger percentage of the sky.

If no natural guide star is available, a laser guide star is created with our laser system, which is also being improved. A new center-launch laser system is being developed for Keck II. With center projection, the system can reduce the perspective elongation of guide star images — leading to more accurate observations.

These advancements promise higher resolution AO observations, and lay the foundation for the next big project Wizinowich and his team are tackling: the development of a new laser for the Keck II AO system.

“The laser we use now was constructed in the late 1990s. It uses a lot of electrical power and generates a relatively small amount of light-return from the sodium ions,” said Adkins. “The new laser will have more power, and consume only about one-tenth of the electricity.”

Flying The Friendly SkiesWhile the laser guide-star adaptive-optics systems improve clarity of our vast universe, these powerful lasers could pose dangers to the eyes of pilots flying aircraft near the observatory.

Until recently, the Federal Aviation Administration required humans to monitor airspace around the observatory on nights the lasers were active. These spotters could shutter the lasers if aircraft flew too close, but they faced tough environmental conditions and long hours on the summit that sometimes compromised their ability to provide optimal safety oversight.

To overcome these hardships and better protect pilots, Keck Observatory engineer Paul Stomski and his team updated Keck Observatory’s aircraft-protection system with a key piece of technology called Transponder Based Aircraft Detector.

The TBAD system assesses the signal strength from aircraft transponders as they “squawk,” or broadcast, pertinent data to airports and other aircraft. TBAD detects the radio-frequency signals using two bore-sighted radio antennas. Using wide- and narrow-beam antennas, the system compares aircraft squawk signal strength to thresholds defined by Stomski and his team. If an aircraft is detected within the narrow beam, the laser is automatically shuttered.

This new system detects aircraft more reliably than human spotters and saves a significant amount of money.

“We were actually the first facility of any kind to get an automated aircraft protection system approved by the FAA under these new rules,” Stomski said. The most recent incarnation of the system was implemented on Keck I in 2014.

Taking A Byte Out Of BitsSince its inception, Keck Observatory has harnessed the power of the computer to push mankind’s understanding of the cosmos. To stay on the cutting edge, a team led by Denny Birch, Keck Observatory’s manager of computer and networking systems, began migrating the observatory’s physical servers to virtualized platforms in 2012. Virtualization provides increased performance, reliability and cost savings for Keck Observatory’s computer operations.

“The virtual servers are crazy fast and crazy efficient,” Birch said.

Virtualization is, at its core, the consolidation of the main components of normal computers (CPU, disk drive, memory) into a smaller number of shared components that can then be made more powerful. The speed offered by virtualization can come from the higher performance components, and it is cheaper and takes less energy by sharing their resources.

For Keck Observatory, virtualization saves money on physical hardware and electricity costs, as well as provides better system stability, recovery features and performance. Tasks that took days now take

a matter of minutes, and the system can flexibly respond to changing computing needs. For instance, Keck Observatory staff used to order new physical servers and install them when more computing power was needed. Now, virtualization allows someone like Birch to clone a virtual server and create a new one in a few minutes — with just a few clicks.

Data recovery and redundancy saw major improvements, too. The system “snapshots” servers regularly, meaning that Birch and his team can delete a virtual server and replace it with a restored one from the snapshot — losing only a few minutes of data in the event of a system crash. Virtualized systems also have each other’s backs: The system automatically disperses loads and tasks to other servers if a server fails.

Running Virtual Machines Dramatically Cut Power Costs“The system saved us about $85,000 in FY 2014,” Birch said. “It will save even more as we migrate desktops.”

These projects are a few examples of Keck Observatory’s relentless pursuit of great science made possible by its world-class mechanical, software and electrical engineers.

Following spread:A unique view from behind Keck II’s powerful 10-meter mirror at the Milky Way and the cosmos beyond.

Credit: Ric Noyle



Education & OutreachKeck Observatory has long been recognized as having the finest, most impactful education and outreach programs of any similar astronomy research facility based upon both qualitative and quantitative metrics. In this year’s annual report, we highlight some of the activities that brought to life our mission “… to share our discoveries and inspire the imagination of all.” The educational impact of our programs is both local and global with a typical cumulative reach of more than 20,000 Friends and Fans every week. What follows is a summary of five of the myriad ways we share and inspire the world with our science.

This is an example of a “Science News” email header that was sent out in 2014, one of six different series of emails we regularly send to nearly 11,000 subscribers.

Keck NationKeck Nation is a four-star list of Scientists, Friends and Fans get first access to Science News, Events and new content as we create it.

When the weather is clear, the West Hawaii Astronomy Club sets up their impressive telescopes outside the Kahilu Theatre for participants of the Astronomy Talks for get a better look at the heavens. Credit: Ric Noyle

Our average open rate across all campaigns was 30.3%. Industry Average 21.4%

Our average click rate across all campaigns was 3.9%. Industry Average 2.4%

Most popular email: COSMIC MATTERS: RARE SUPERNOVA EXPLODES IN FRONT OF KECK'S GIGANTIC EYE; 11.5% Click rate; Sent on January 24, 2014.


A Deep View on the Early Universe, Extreme Makeovers and Overweight Galaxies with Dr. Mariska Kriek (August 13, 2014)

First Light in the Universe, the End of the Cosmic Dark Ages with Dr. Michael Bolte (June 19, 2014)

Zooming into the Center of our Galaxy with Keck Observatory with Dr. Leo Meyer (May 20, 2014)

Examining the Planet-Forming Zone Around New Stars with Dr. Greg Doppmann (February 11, 2014)

The Search for Other Earths with Dr. Andrew Howard (November 21, 2013)

The Wonder of Comet ISON, A Relic From the Beginning of the Solar System with Dr. Carey Lisse (October 24, 2013)

Classroom VisitsSchools from all over Hawaii Island send students to our Headquarters as well as receive members from our Outreach team to learn more about science, physics and astronomy.

21 school visits reached 480 students

Astronomy TalksWe hosted six Astronomy Talks last fiscal year attended by about 1,500 people and played them on our website and social media channels 10,803 times.

Top: Members of the Keck Observatory Outreach Team (Mikel Brand, Steve Jefferson, Luis Rizzi, Julia Sinnibus, Marc Kacais, Randy Campbell, Jim Lyke, Al Honey, Liz Chock) provide experiments and excitement to kids of all ages, in the hope of fueling their passion to pursue science.Middle and bottom: Students from around the island come out to headquarters in Waimea to be inspired by the universe. Credits: Ric Noyle, Andrew Cooper, Andrew Cooper

Credit: Andrew Cooper


Keck Observatory GuidestarsThe Guidestars are patrons of the W. M. Keck Observatory, who, in addition to contributing cash donations to Keck’s instrumentation programs, also give generously as volunteers committed to educating and informing guests who visit the Keck Headquarters in Waimea. This docent program offers enthusiasts a rare insider view into the discoveries and technologies of Keck Observatory and Hawaii astronomy. In 2014, the Guidestars were Rosalind Butterfield, Carol Davies, Elaine Dobinson, Richard and Sue Humphries, Scott Neish, Maureen Salmi, Jane Sherwood, Elizabeth Sonne, Robert Steele, Jack Toigo, and Marcia and Stanley Wishnick. Credit: Ric Noyle

Live From Keck Observatory: The Supermassive Black Hole Keck Observatory hosts the UCLA Galactic Center Group (July 7, 2014)

Comet ISON with Dr. Carey Lisse (October 28, 2013)

Live Observing Run videos were played 7,218 times.

Live Observing RunsThere is no eyepiece to look through, so twice last year we broadcast Live Observing Runs so our friends and fans could see what the visiting scientists do during their coveted time at Keck Observatory.

Social MediaContent is King and, as operators of the two largest and most scientifically productive telescopes on Earth, we are proud to share information that cannot be created anywhere else on the planet.

During the Live Observing Run, one of the scientists shows more than 2,000 viewers a live shot of the black hole at the center of the Milky Way galaxy as seen by the mighty Keck Observatory.

4500 6900 8300 2012 2013 2014

Friends

700 1400 2700 2012 2013 2014

Followers


The 13,796-foot Mauna Kea summit has no nearby mountain ranges to roil the upper atmosphere. Few city lights pollute Hawaii night skies and for most of the year the atmosphere above Mauna Kea is clear, calm and dry.

Credit: Andrew Hara

Stars Close to HomeThe W. M. Keck Observatory pays tribute to several astronomer stars who have shown brightly over many years

The professionals of Keck Observatory made 2014 a banner year in their dedication to promote humanity’s understanding of the cosmos and prove the brightest stars often are found closest to home. Here we recognize select milestones in Keck Observatory’s distinguished community.

An Optics Visionary RetiresIn July 2014, renowned astronomer Harland Epps retired from his position at the University of California, Santa Cruz, where he was professor of astronomy and astrophysics. Over his long career, Epps developed optics for astronomical instruments, including some of those used at the Keck Observatory. His latest contributions to Keck Observatory were the optics on the Multi-Object Spectrograph For InfraRed Exploration, or MOSFIRE, on the Keck I telescope, which was completed in 2012.

In 2014, Epps also was honored by the Astronomical Society of the Pacific for his contributions to optics developments in the field. He will be greatly missed.

Interim Director of UC Observatories Steps DownAstronomer Sandra Faber stepped down from her role as interim director of the University of California Observatories, a research unit at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Her two-year role ended in June 2014.

In addition to playing a major role in research and telescope development at the Keck Observatory, her work as a professor at UC Santa Cruz and as a member of the Keck Observatory community focused primarily on galaxy formation.

In 2013, Faber was awarded the National Medal of Science by President Barack Obama who called her, according to the Santa Cruz Sentinel, “one of the world’s foremost experts in the evolution of the universe.”

Master Scheduler’s Career Honored by The Man In 2014, the Keck Observatory community bid farewell to Barbara Schaefer, the longtime telescope scheduler who announced her retirement. Jerry Nelson, astronomer and project scientist who conceived of and designed the Keck Observatory, penned a fitting tribute to her.

In the tribute, Nelson mentioned Schaefer’s longtime commitment to the Keck Observatory, saying: “You have devoted much of your career to Ten Meter Telescope/Keck, as have I. For me it started in 1977 and not too long after that I met you and infected you with the giant telescope bug. You bounced around between Kitt Peak and the IRTF at Maunakea, but finally came to Berkeley at LBL where you took up the job of helping to make the Ten Meter Telescope a reality.”

He also noted Schaefer’s unflagging dedication to the observational community and how her drive turned astronomers’ dreams into reality.

“Your many skills and dedication were crucial in our successes, and your sassy and spunky ways got us through more than one rough spot. You were always willing to do whatever it took to get the job done right.”


Harland Epps

Sandra Faber

Barbara Schaefer (right)

Nelson ended by pointing out what everyone in the Keck Observatory community has learned over Schaefer’s storied career: “You are unique and played a critical role in building and operating the Keck telescopes. I trust you are rightly proud of all that you have done, and as a result what the Keck telescopes have achieved.”

Accolades for Observers in the Keck Observatory CommunityThe Keck Observatory and its community of observers played an integral role in expanding knowledge of our galactic neighborhood. And the scientific community took notice.

In 2014, University of Hawaii at Manoa astronomer R. Brent Tully and his team won the Gruber Foundation Cosmology Prize for their work in Near Field Cosmology. Tully and his team study our “nearby” universe to map out far larger galactic vistas, including a supercluster of galaxies that spans 500 million light-years. Tully has regularly observed at the Keck Observatory since 1997.

Keck Observatory played a central role in the work of 2013’s Cozzarelli Prize winners. The award is given by the National Academy of Sciences to recognize scientific excellence and originality. It was awarded to University of Hawaii at Manoa astronomer Andrew Howard, University of California, Berkeley astrophysicist Geoffrey Marcy, and graduate student Erik Petigura for their paper, which statistically proves that 20 percent of Sun-like stars in the Milky Way have Earth-sized planets orbiting in their habitable zones.

Howard and Petigura wrote the paper using data from the Keck Observatory and NASA’s Kepler spacecraft. The paper’s findings give NASA and other scientists concrete information used to hunt for Earth-like worlds that may support life.


R. Brent Tully

Geoffrey Marcy

Erik Petigura

Mauna Kea is a very special place. Credit: Andrew Hara


Science BibliographyRefereed publications FY2014

Alavi, A.; Siana, B.; Richard, J.; et al. Ultra-faint Ultraviolet Galaxies at z~2 Behind the Lensing Cluster Abell 1689: the Luminosity Function, Dust Extinction and Star Formation Rate Density ApJ 780 143 2014 January

Alonso, R.; Moutou, C.; Endl, M.; et al. Transiting exoplanets from the CoRoT space mission: XXIV. CoRoT-24: A transiting multi-planet system A&A 567A 112 2014 July

Anglada-Escudé, G.; Arriagada, P.; Tuomi, M.; et al. Two planets around Kapteyn’s star: a cold and a temperate super-Earth orbiting the nearest halo red-dwarf MNRAS 443 L89 2014 September

Arnold, J.; Romanowsky, A.; Brodie, J.; et al. The SLUGGS Survey: Wide-field Stellar Kinematics of Early-type Galaxies ApJ 791 80 2014 September

Ascaso, B.; Lemaux, B.; Lubin, L.; et al. The Violent Youth of Bright and Massive Cluster Galaxies and their Maturation over 7 Billion Years MNRAS 442 589 2014 July

Barger, A.; Cowie, L.; Chen, C.; et al. Is There a Maximum Star Formation Rate in High-Redshift Galaxies? ApJ 784 9 2014 March

Barth, A.; Voevodkin, A.; Carson, D.; Wozniak, P. A Search for Optical Variability of Type 2 Quasars in SDSS Stripe 82 AJ 147 12 2014 January

Bastien, F.; Stassun, K.; Pepper, J.; et al. Radial Velocity Variations of Photometrically Quiet, Chromospherically Inactive Kepler Stars: A Link Between RV Jitter and Photometric Flicker AJ 147 29 2014 February

Batista, V.; Beaulieu, J.; Gould, A.; et al. MOA-2011-BLG-293Lb: First Microlensing Planet Possibly in the Habitable Zone ApJ 780 54 2014 January

Bechter, E.; Crepp, J.; Ngo, H.; et al. WASP-12b and HAT-P-8b are Members of Triple Star Systems ApJ 788 2 2014 July

Bedin, L.; Ruiz-Lapuente, P.; Gonzalez Hernandez, J.; et al. Improved Hubble Space Telescope Proper Motions for Tycho-G and Other Stars in the Remnant of Tycho’s Supernova 1572 MNRAS 439 354 2014 March

Beichman, C.; Gelino, C.; Kirkpatrick, J.; et al. WISE Y Dwarfs As Probes of the Brown Dwarf-Exoplanet Connection ApJ 783 68 2014 March

Bennett, D.; Batista, V.; Bond, I.; et al. MOA-2011-BLG-262Lb: A Sub-Earth-Mass Moon Orbiting a Gas Giant Primary or a High Velocity Planetary System in the Galactic Bulge ApJ 785 155 2014 April

Berg, T.; Ellison, S.; Venn, K.; Prochaska, J. A search for boron in damped Lyα systems MNRAS 434 2892 2013 October

Berthier, J.; Vachier, F.; Marchis, F.; et al. Physical and dynamical properties of the main belt triple Asteroid (87) Sylvia Icarus 239 118 2014 September

Bezanson, R.; van Dokkum, P.; van de Sande, J.; et al. Tight Correlations between Massive Galaxy Structural Properties and Dynamics: The Mass Fundamental Plane was in Place by z ~ 2 ApJ 779 L21 2013 December

Bizzocchi, L.; Filho, M.; Leonardo, E.; et al. Bulgeless Galaxies at Intermediate Redshift: Sample Selection, Color Properties, and the Existence of Powerful Active Galactic Nuclei ApJ 782 22 2014 February

Blom, C.; Forbes, D.; Foster, C.; et al. The SLUGGS Survey: new evidence for a tidal interaction between the early-type galaxies NGC 4365 and NGC 4342 MNRAS 439 2420 2014 April

Boley, P.; Linz, H.; van Boekel, R.; et al. The VLTI/MIDI survey of massive young stellar objects. Sounding the inner regions around intermediate- and high-mass young stars using mid-infrared interferometry A&A 558 A24 2013 October

Bonnefoy, M.; Currie, T.; Marleau, G.; et al. Characterization of the gaseous companion kappa Andromedae b. New Keck and LBTI high-contrast observations A&A 562 A111 2014 February

Borka, D.; Jovanovic, P.; Borka Jovanovic, V.; Zakharov, A. Constraining the range of Yukawa gravity interaction from S2 star orbits JCAP 11 050 2013 November

Bower, G.; Markoff, S.; Brunthaler, A.; et al. The Intrinsic Two-dimensional Size of Sagittarius A* ApJ 790 1 2014 July

Bowler, B.; Liu, M.; Kraus, A.; Mann, A. Spectroscopic Confirmation of Young Planetary-mass Companions on Wide Orbits ApJ 784 65 2014 March

Brewer, B.; Marshall, P.; Auger, M.; et al. The SWELLS survey – VI. Hierarchical inference of the initial mass functions of bulges and discs MNRAS 437 1950 2014 January

Brodwin, M.; Stanford, S.; Gonzalez, A.; et al. The Era of Star Formation in Galaxy Clusters ApJ 779 138 2013 December

Brown, M. The Density of Mid-sized Kuiper Belt Object 2002 UX25 and the Formation of the Dwarf Planets ApJ 778 L34 2013 December

A&A: Astronomy & Astrophysics

AJ: The Astronomical Journal

AREPS: Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences

Ap&SS: Astrophysics and Space Science

ApJ: The Astrophysical Journal

ApJS: The Astrophysical Journal Supplement

AsNa: Astronomische Nachrichten

CMDA: Celestial Mechanics and Dynamical Astronomy

Icarus: Icarus

JQSRT: Journal of Quantitative Spectroscopy and Radiative Transfer

MNRAS: Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society

Nature: Nature

PASP: Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific

PRL: Physical Review Letters

PSS: Planetary and Space Science

Science: Science

Key to Publications:


Buchhave, L.; Bizzarro, M.; Latham, D.; et al. Three regimes of extrasolar planet radius inferred from host star metallicities Nature 509 593 2014 May

Burt, J.; Vogt, S.; Butler, R.; et al. The Lick-Carnegie Exoplanet Survey: Gliese 687 b—A Neptune-mass Planet Orbiting a Nearby Red Dwarf ApJ 789 114 2014 July

Bussmann, R.; Pérez-Fournon, I.; Amber, S.; et al. Gravitational Lens Models Based on Submillimeter Array Imaging of Herschel-selected Strongly Lensed Sub-millimeter Galaxies at z>1.5 ApJ 779 25 2013 December

Cantalupo, S.; Arrigoni-Battaia, F.; Prochaska, J.; et al. A cosmic web filament revealed in Lyman-α emission around a luminous high-redshift quasar Nature 506 63 2014 February

Carolo, E.; Desidera, S.; Gratton, R.; et al. A vigorous activity cycle mimicking a planetary system in HD 200466 A&A 567 A48 2014 July

Carrasco Kind, M.; Brunner, R. Exhausting the information: novel Bayesian combination of photometric redshift PDFs MNRAS 442 3380 2014 August

Castro, P.; Gizis, J.; Harris, H.; et al. Discovery of Four High Proper Motion L Dwarfs, Including a 10 pc L Dwarf at the L/T Transition ApJ 776 126 2013 November

Chen, J.; Wang, X.; Ganeshalingam, M.; et al. Optical Observations of the Type Ic Supernova 2007gr in NGC 1058 ApJ 790 120 2014 August

Chonis, T.; Blanc, G.; Hill, G.; et al. The Spectrally Resolved Lya Emission of Three Lyα-selected Field Galaxies at z ~ 2.4 from the HETDEX Pilot Survey ApJ 775 99 2013 October

Cohen, J.; Christlieb, N.; Thompson, I.; et al. Normal and Outlying Populations of the Milky Way Stellar Halo at [Fe/H] <–2 ApJ 778 56 2013 November

Collins, K.; Eastman, J.; Beatty, T.; et al. KELT-6b: A P~7.9 d Hot Saturn Transiting a Metal-Poor Star with a Long-Period Companion AJ 147 39 2014 February

Cooke, R.; Pettini, M.; Jorgenson, R.; et al. Precision Measures of the Primordial Abundance of Deuterium ApJ 781 31 2014 January

Corsi, A.; Ofek, E.; Gal-Yam, A.; et al. A Multi-wavelength Investigation of the Radio-loud Supernova PTF11qcj and its Circumstellar Environment ApJ 782 42 2014 February

Crawford, S.; Wirth, G.; Bershady, M. Spatial and Kinematic Distributions of Transition Populations in Intermediate Redshift Galaxy Clusters ApJ 786 30 2014 May

Crepp, J.; Johnson, J.; Howard, A.; et al. The TRENDS High-Contrast Imaging Survey. V. Discovery of an Old and Cold Benchmark T-dwarf Orbiting the Nearby G-star HD 19467 ApJ 781 29 2014 January

Crighton, N.; Hennawi, J.; Prochaska, J. Metal-Poor, Cool Gas in the Circumgalactic Medium of a z = 2.4 Star-Forming Galaxy: Direct Evidence for Cold Accretion? ApJ 776 L18 2013 October

Croll, B.; Rappaport, S.; DeVore, J.; et al. Multiwavelength Observations of the Candidate Disintegrating Sub-Mercury KIC 12557548b ApJ 786 100 2014 May

Crossfield, I.; Barman, T.; Hansen, B.; Howard, A. Warm ice giant GJ 3470b I. A flat transmission spectrum indicates a hazy, low-methane, and/or metal-rich atmosphere A&A 559 A33 2013 November

Cucchiara, A.; Prochaska, J.; Perley, D.; et al. Gemini Spectroscopy of the Short GRB 130603B Afterglow and Host ApJ 777 94 2013 November

Currie, T.; Cloutier, R.; Debes, J.; et al. A Deep Keck/NIRC2 Search for Thermal Emission from Planetary Companions Orbiting Fomalhaut ApJ 777 L6 2013 November

Currie, T.; Daemgen, S.; Debes, J.; et al. Direct Imaging and Spectroscopy of a Candidate Companion Below/Near the Deuterium-Burning Limit In The Young Binary Star System, ROXs 42B ApJ 780 L30 2014 January

Currie, T.; Burrows, A.; Daemgen, S. A First-Look Atmospheric Modeling Study of the Young Directly-Imaged Planet-Mass Companion, ROXs 42Bb ApJ 787 104 2014 June

Cushing, M.; Kirkpatrick, J.; Gelino, C.; et al. Three New Cool Brown Dwarfs Discovered with the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) and an Improved Spectrum of the Y0 Dwarf WISE J041022.71+150248.4 AJ 147 113 2014 May

Dawson, R.; Johnson, J.; Fabrycky, D.; et al. Large eccentricity, low mutual inclination: the three-dimensional architecture of a hierarchical system of giant planets ApJ 791 89 2014 September

de Pater, I.; Dunn, D.; Stam, D.; et al. Keck and VLT AO observations and models of the uranian rings during the 2007 ring plane crossings Icarus 226 1399 2013 November

de Pater, I.; Fletcher, L.; Luszcz-Cook, S.; et al. Neptune’s global circulation deduced from multi-wavelength observations Icarus 237 211 2014 July

Dello Russo, N.; Vervack, R.; Kawakita, H.; et al. The volatile composition of 81P/Wild 2 from ground-based high-resolution infrared spectroscopy Icarus 238 125 2014 August

Deshpande, R.; Blake, C.; Bender, C.; et al. The SDSS-III APOGEE Radial Velocity Survey of M Dwarfs. I. Description of the Survey and Science Goals AJ 146 156 2013 December

DiSanti, M.; Villanueva, G.; Paganini, L.; et al. Pre- and post-perihelion observations of C/2009 P1 (Garradd): Evidence for an oxygen-rich heritage? Icarus 228 167 2014 January

Do, T.; Martinez, G.; Yelda, S.; et al. Three-dimensional Stellar Kinematics at the Galactic Center: Measuring the Nuclear Star Cluster Spatial Density Profile, Black Hole Mass, and Distance ApJ 779 L6 2013 December

Dorman, C.; Widrow, L.; Guhathakurta, P.; et al. A New Approach to Detailed Structural Decomposition from the SPLASH and PHAT Surveys: Kicked-up Disk Stars in the Andromeda Galaxy? ApJ 779 103 2013 December

Dowell, C.; Conley, A.; Glenn, J.; et al. HerMES: Candidate High-redshift Galaxies Discovered with Herschel/SPIRE ApJ 780 75 2014 January

Drummond, J.; Carry, B.; Merline, W.; et al. Dwarf planet Ceres: Ellipsoid dimensions and rotational pole from Keck and VLT adaptive optics images Icarus 236 28 2014 July

Dupree, A.; Brickhouse, N.; Cranmer, S.; et al. Structure and Dynamics of the Accretion Process and Wind in TW Hya ApJ 789 27 2014 July

Dupuy, T.; Liu, M.; Ireland, M. New Evidence for a Substellar Luminosity Problem: Dynamical Mass for the Brown Dwarf Binary Gl 417BC ApJ 790 133 2014 August

Durré, M.; Mould, J. Young Star Clusters in the Circumnuclear Region of NGC 2110 ApJ 784 79 2014 March

Dutta, R.; Srianand, R.; Rahmani, H.; et al. A study of low-metallicity DLAs at high redshift and C II* as a probe of their physical conditions MNRAS 440 307 2014 March

Errmann, R.; Torres, G.; Schmidt, T.; et al. Investigation of a transiting planet candidate in Trumpler 37: An astrophysical false positive eclipsing spectroscopic binary star AN 335 345 2014 January

Errmann, R.; Raetz, St.; Kitze, M.; et al. The search for transiting planets using the YETI network CoSka 43 513 2014 March

Esposito, T.; Fitzgerald, M.; Graham, J.; Kalas, P. Modeling Self-Subtraction in Angular Differential Imaging: Application to the HD 32297 Debris Disk ApJ 780 25 2014 January

Evans, T.; Murphy, M. A new method for detecting velocity shifts and distortions between optical spectra ApJ 778 173 2013 December

Faisst, A.; Capak, P.; Carollo, C.; et al. Spectroscopic Observation of Lyman alpha Emitters at z ~ 7.7 and Implications on Re-ionization ApJ 788 87 2014 June

Faran, T.; Poznanski, D.; Filippenko, A.; et al. Photometric and Spectroscopic Properties of Type II-P Supernovae MNRAS 442 844 2014 July

Fardal, M.; Weinberg, M.; Babul, A.; et al. Inferring the Andromeda Galaxy’s mass from its giant southern stream with Bayesian simulation sampling MNRAS 434 2779 2013 October

Farihi, J.; Gänsicke, B.; Koester, D. Evidence for Water in the Rocky Debris of a Disrupted Extrasolar Minor Planet Science 342 218 2013 October

Finkelstein, S.; Papovich, C.; Dickinson, M.; et al. A galaxy rapidly forming stars 700 million years after the Big Bang at redshift 7.51 Nature 502 524 2013 October


Fitzpatrick, P.; de Pater, I.; Luszcz-Cook, S.; et al. Dispersion in Neptune’s Zonal Wind Velocities from NIR Keck AO Observations in July 2009 Ap&SS 350 65 2014 March

Fletcher, L.; de Pater, I.; Orton, G.; et al. Neptune at summer solstice: Zonal mean temperatures from ground-based observations, 2003-2007 Icarus 231 146 2014 March

Foster, C.; Arnold, J.; Forbes, D.; et al. The SLUGGS Survey: outer triaxiality of the Fast Rotator elliptical NGC 4473 MNRAS 435 3587 2013 November

Foster, C.; Lux, H.; Romanowsky, A.; et al. Kinematics and simulations of the stellar stream in the halo of the Umbrella Galaxy MNRAS 442 3544 2014 August

Foster, J.; Arce, H.; Kassis, M.; et al. Distributed Low-mass Star Formation in the IRDC G34.43+00.24 ApJ 791 108 2014 August

Fox, O.; Bostroem, K.; Van Dyk, S.; et al. Uncovering the Putative B-Star Binary Companion of the SN 1993J Progenitor ApJ 790 17 2014 July

Frank, M. J. Observational dynamics of low-mass stellar systems AN 335 486 2014 January

Frebel, A.; Simon, J.; Kirby, E. Segue 1: An Unevolved Fossil Galaxy from the Early Universe ApJ 786 74 2014 May

Fremling, C.; Sollerman, J.; Taddia, F.; et al. The rise and fall of the Type Ib supernova iPTF13bvn – Not a massive Wolf-Rayet star A&A 565 A114 2014 May

Gal-Yam, A.; Arcavi, I.; Ofek, E.; et al. A Wolf-Rayet-like progenitor of SN 2013cu from spectral observations of a stellar wind Nature 509 471 2014 May

Gavazzi, R.; Marshall, P.; Treu, T.; Sonnenfeld, A. RingFinder: automated detection of galaxy-scale gravitational lenses in ground-based multi-filter imaging data ApJ 785 144 2014 April

Gelino, C.; Smart, R.; Marocco, F.; et al. WISEP J061135.13-041024.0 AB: A J-band Flux Reversal Binary at the L/T Transition AJ 148 6 2014 July

Gibb, E.; Horne, D. Detection of CH4 in the GV Tau N Protoplanetary Disk ApJ 776 L28 2013 October

Gizis, J.; Burgasser, A.; Berger, E.; et al. Kepler Monitoring of an L Dwarf I. The Photometric Period and White Light Flares ApJ 779 172 2013 December

Glazebrook, K. The Dawes Review 1: Kinematic Studies of Star-Forming Galaxies Across Cosmic Time PASA 30 2013 November

Glikman, E.; Urrutia, T.; Lacy, M.; et al. Dust Reddened Quasars in FIRST and UKIDSS: Beyond the Tip of the Iceberg ApJ 778 127 2013 December

Gorbikov, E.; Gal-Yam, A.; Ofek, E.; et al. iPTF13beo: The Double-Peaked Light Curve of a Type Ibn Supernova Discovered Shortly after Explosion MNRAS 443 671 2014 September

Graham, M.; Djorgovski, S.; Drake, A.; et al. A novel variability-based method for quasar selection: evidence for a rest frame ~54 day characteristic timescale MNRAS 439 703 2014 March

Graur, O.; Rodney, S.; Maoz, D.; et al. Type-Ia Supernova Rates to Redshift 2.4 from CLASH: The Cluster Lensing And Supernova Survey with Hubble ApJ 783 28 2014 March

Greene, J.; Seth, A.; Lyubenova, M.; et al. Circumnuclear Molecular Gas in Megamaser Disk Galaxies NGC 4388 and NGC 1194 ApJ 788 145 2014 June

Haas, M.; Leipski, C.; Barthel, P.; et al. 3C 220.3: a radio galaxy lensing a submillimeter galaxy ApJ 790 46 2014 July

Harris, H.; Dahn, C.; Dupuy, T.; et al. The Binary White Dwarf LHS 3236 ApJ 779 21 2013 December

Hartman, J.; Bakos, G.; Torres, G.; et al. HAT-P-44b, HAT-P-45b, and HAT-P-46b: Three Transiting Hot Jupiters in Possible Multi-Planet Systems AJ 147 128 2014 June

Hinkley, S.; Pueyo, L.; Faherty, J.; et al. The Kappa Andromedae System: New Constraints on the Companion Mass, System Age and Further Multiplicity ApJ 779 153 2013 December

Howard, A.; Sanchis-Ojeda, R.; Marcy, G.; et al. A Rocky Composition for an Earth-sized Exoplanet Nature 503 381 2013 November

Huber, D.; Carter, J.; Barbieri, M.; et al. Stellar Spin-Orbit Misalignment in a Multiplanet System Science 342 331 2013 October

Hueso, R.; Pérez-Hoyos, S.; Sánchez-Lavega, A.; et al. Impact flux on Jupiter: From superbolides to large-scale collisions A&A 560 A55 2013 December

Huff, E.; Eifler, T.; Hirata, C.; et al. Seeing in the dark – II. Cosmic shear in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey MNRAS 440 1322 2014 May

Jennings, Z.; Strader, J.; Romanowsky, A.; et al. The SLUGGS Survey: HST/ACS Mosaic Imaging of the NGC 3115 Globular Cluster System AJ 148 32 2014 August

Jewitt, D.; Agarwal, J.; Li, J.; et al. Disintegrating Asteroid P/2013 R3 ApJ 784 L8 2014 March

Johnson, S.; Chen, H.; Mulchaey, J.; et al. Discovery of a transparent sightline at ρ ≲ 20 kpc from an interacting pair of galaxies MNRAS 438 3039 2014 March

Jones, T.; Ellis, R.; Schenker, M.; Stark, D. Keck Spectroscopy of Gravitationally Lensed z ≃ 4 Galaxies: Improved Constraints on the Escape Fraction of Ionizing Photons ApJ 779 52 2013 December

Jorgenson, R.; Wolfe, A. Spatially Resolved Emission of a High-redshift DLA Galaxy with the Keck/OSIRIS IFU ApJ 785 16 2014 April

Jura, M.; Klein, B.; Xu, S.; Young, E. A Pilot Search for Evidence of Extrasolar Earth-analog Plate Tectonics ApJ 791 L29 2014 August

Kacprzak, G.; Cooke, J.; Churchill, C.; et al. The Smooth Mg II gas distribution through the interstellar/extra-planar/halo interface ApJ 777 L11 2013 November

Kammer, J.; Knutson, H.; Howard, A. W.; et al. A Spitzer Search for Transits of Radial Velocity Detected Super-Earths ApJ 781 103 2014 February

Kane, S.; Howell, S.; Horch, E.; et al. Limits on Stellar Companions to Exoplanet Host Stars With Eccentric Planets ApJ 785 93 2014 April

Kanekar, N.; Prochaska, J.; Smette, A.; et al. The spin temperature of high-redshift damped Lyman α systems MNRAS 438 2131 2014 March

Kaplan, D.; Boyles, J.; Dunlap, B.; et al. A 1.05 M ⊙ Companion to PSR J2222-0137: The Coolest Known White Dwarf? ApJ 789 119 2014 July

Karnath, N.; Prato, L.; Wasserman, L.; et al. Orbital Parameters for the Two Young Binaries VSB 111 and VSB 126 AJ 146 149 2013 December

Kawakita, H.; Dello Russo, N.; Vervack, R.; et al. Extremely Organic-rich Coma of Comet C/2010 G2 (Hill) during its Outburst in 2012 ApJ 788 110 2014 June

Kelly, P.; Fox, O.; Filippenko, A.; et al. Constraints on the Progenitor System of the Type Ia Supernova 2014J from Pre-explosion Hubble Space Telescope Imaging ApJ 790 3 2014 July

Kenney, J.; Geha, M.; Jachym, P.; et al. Transformation of a Virgo Cluster Dwarf Irregular Galaxy by Ram Pressure Stripping: IC3418 and its Fireballs ApJ 780 119 2014 January

Kipping, D.; Forgan, D.; Hartman, J.; et al. The Hunt for Exomoons with Kepler (HEK): III. The First Search for an Exomoon around a Habitable-Zone Planet ApJ 777 134 2013 November

Kirby, E.; Cohen, J.; Guhathakurta, P.; et al. The Universal Stellar Mass-Stellar Metallicity Relation for Dwarf Galaxies ApJ 779 102 2013 December

Kirby, E.; Bullock, J.; Boylan-Kolchin, M.; et al. The dynamics of isolated Local Group galaxies MNRAS 439 1015 2014 March

Kirkpatrick, J.; Schneider, A.; Fajardo-Acosta, S.; et al. The AllWISE Motion Survey and The Quest for Cold Subdwarfs ApJ 783 122 2014 March

Kishimoto, M.; Hoenig, S.; Antonucci, R.; et al. Evidence for a receding dust sublimation region around a supermassive black hole ApJ 775 L36 2013 October

Kislyakova, K.; Johnstone, C.; Odert, P.; et al. Stellar wind interaction and pick-up ion escape of the Kepler-11 “super-Earths” A&A 562 A116 2014 February

Knutson, H.; Fulton, B.; Montet, B.; et al. Friends of Hot Jupiters. I. A Radial Velocity Search for Massive, Long-period Companions to Close-in Gas Giant Planets ApJ 785 126 2014 April


Kobulnicky, H.; Kiminki, D.; Lundquist, M.; et al. Toward Complete Statistics of Massive Binary Stars: Penultimate Results from the Cygnus OB2 Radial Velocity Survey ApJS 213 34 2014 September

Kostrzewa-Rutkowska, Z.; Kozlowski, S.; Wyrzykowski, L.; et al. A plausible (overlooked) super-luminous supernova in the SDSS Stripe 82 data ApJ 778 168 2013 December

Kraus, A.; Ireland, M.; Cieza, L.; et al. Three Wide Planetary-Mass Companions to FW Tau, ROXs 12, and ROXs 42B ApJ 781 20 2014 January

Kudritzki, R.; Urbaneja, M.; Gazak, Z.; et al. A Direct Stellar Metallicity Determination in the Disk of the Maser Galaxy NGC 4258 ApJ 779 L20 2013 December

Larsen, S.; Brodie, J.; Forbes, D.; Strader, J. Chemical composition and constraints on mass loss for globular clusters in dwarf galaxies: WLM and IKN A&A 565 A98 2014 May

Lehner, N.; O’Meara, J.; Fox, A.; et al. Galactic and Circumgalactic OVI and its Impact on the Cosmological Metal and Baryon Budgets at 2 < z ≲ 3.5* ApJ 788 119 2014 June

Leja, J.; van Dokkum, P.; Momcheva, I.; et al. Exploring the chemical link between local ellipticals and their high-redshift progenitors ApJ 778 L24 2013 December

Levitan, D.; Kupfer, T.; Groot, P.; et al. PTF1 J191905.19+481506.2 – A Partially Eclipsing AM CVn System Discovered in the Palomar Transient Factory ApJ 785 114 2014 April

Lieu, R.; Duan, L.; Kibble, T. Measurement of the Dispersion of Radiation from a Steady Cosmological Source ApJ 778 73 2013 November

Liu, F.; Asplund, M.; Ramirez, I.; et al. A high precision chemical abundance analysis of the HAT-P-1 stellar binary: constraints on planet formation MNRAS 442 L51 2014 July

Lockwood, A.; Johnson, J.; Bender, C.; et al. Near-IR Direct Detection of Water Vapor in Tau Boötis b ApJ 783 L29 2014 March

Ly, C.; Malkan, M.; Nagao, T.; et al. “Direct” Gas-phase Metallicities, Stellar Properties, and Local Environments of Emission-line Galaxies at Redshift below 0.90 ApJ 780 122 2014 January

Mace, G.; Kirkpatrick, J.; Cushing, M.; et al. The Exemplar T8 Subdwarf Companion of Wolf 1130 ApJ 777 36 2013 November

Marchis, F.; Durech, J.; Castillo-Rogez, J.; et al. The Puzzling Mutual Orbit of the Binary Trojan Asteroid (624) Hektor ApJ 783 L37 2014 March

Marcy, G.; Isaacson, H.; Howard, A.; et al. Masses, Radii, and Orbits of Small Kepler Planets: The Transition from Gaseous to Rocky Planets ApJS 210 20 2014 February

Marcy, G.; Weiss, L.; Petigura, E.; et al. Occurrence and core-envelope structure of 1--4x Earth-size planets around Sun-like stars PNAS 11112655 2014 September

Marion, G.; Vinko, J.; Wheeler, J.; et al. High-Velocity Line Forming Regions in the Type Ia Supernova 2009ig ApJ 777 40 2013 November

Martin, N.; Ibata, R.; Rich, R.; et al. The PAndAS Field of Streams: stellar structures in the Milky Way halo toward Andromeda and Triangulum ApJ 787 19 2014 May

Martin, N.; Chambers, K.; Collins, M.; et al. Spectroscopy of the Three Distant Andromedan Satellites Cassiopeia III, Lacerta I, and Perseus I ApJ 793 L14 2014 September

Massari, D.; Mucciarelli, A.; Ferraro, F.; et al. Chemical and kinematical properties of Galactic bulge stars surrounding the stellar system Terzan 5 ApJ 791 101 2014 August

McCully, C.; Jha, S.; Foley, R.; et al. Hubble Space Telescope and Ground-based Observations of the Type Iax Supernovae SN 2005hk and SN 2008A 2014 May

McLinden, E.; Rhoads, J.; Malhotra, S.; et al. Galactic winds and stellar populations in Lyman α emitting galaxies at z ~3.1 MNRAS 439 446 2014 March

Medling, A.; U, V.; Guedes, J.; et al. Stellar and Gaseous Nuclear Disks Observed in Nearby (U)LIRGs ApJ 784 70 2014 March

Melendez, J.; Ramirez, I.; Karakas, A.; et al. 18 Sco: A Solar Twin Rich in Refractory and Neutron-capture Elements. Implications for Chemical Tagging ApJ 791 14 2014 August

Melin, H.; Stallard, T.; O’Donoghue, J.; et al. On the anticorrelation between H_3^+ temperature and density in giant planet ionospheres MNRAS 438 1611 2014 February

Melis, C.; Zuckerman, B.; Rhee, J.; et al. Copious Amounts of Hot and Cold Dust Orbiting the Main Sequence A-type Stars HD 131488 and HD 121191 ApJ 778 12 2013 November

Meyer, L.; Witzel, G.; Longstaff, F.; Ghez, A. A formal method for identifying distinct states of variability in time-varying sources: SgrA* as an example ApJ 791 24 2014 August

Milisavljevic, D.; Margutti, R.; Crabtree, K.; et al. Interaction Between The Broad-lined Type Ic Supernova 2012ap and Carriers of Diffuse Interstellar Bands ApJ 782 L5 2014 February

Miller, B.; King, J.; Chen, Y.; Boesgaard, A. Nitrogen Abundances and the Distance Moduli of the Pleiades and Hyades PASP 125 1297 2013 November

Miller, S.; Ellis, R.; Newman, A.; Benson, A. The Dwarfs beyond: The Stellar-to-halo Mass Relation for a New Sample of Intermediate Redshift Low-mass Galaxies ApJ 782 115 2014 February

Montet, B.; Crepp, J.; Johnson, J.; et al. The TRENDS High-contrast Imaging Survey. IV. The Occurrence Rate of Giant Planets around M Dwarfs ApJ 781 28 2014 January

Morgan, A.; Perley, D.; Cenko, S.; et al. Evidence for Dust Destruction from the Early-time Colour Change of GRB120119A MNRAS 440 1810 2014 May

Mortier, A.; Santos, N.; Sousa, S.; et al. New and updated stellar parameters for 90 transit hosts. The effect of the surface gravity A&A 558 A106 2013 October

Mostardi, R.; Shapley, A.; Nestor, D.; et al. Narrowband Lyman-Continuum Imaging of Galaxies at ~ 2.85 ApJ 779 65 2013 December

Müller, T.; Miyata, T.; Kiss, C.; et al. Physical properties of asteroid 308635 (2005 YU55) derived from multi-instrument infrared observations during a very close Earth approach A&A 558 A97 2013 October

Napolitano, N.; Pota, V.; Romanowsky, A.; et al. The SLUGGS survey: breaking degeneracies between dark matter, anisotropy and the IMF using globular cluster subpopulations in the giant elliptical NGC 5846 MNRAS 439 659 2014 March

Naud, M.; Artigau, É.; Malo, L.; et al. Discovery of a Wide Planetary-mass Companion to the Young M3 Star GU Psc ApJ 787 5 2014 May

Nelson, E.; van Dokkum, P.; Franx, M.; et al. A massive galaxy in its core formation phase three billion years after the Big Bang Nature 513 394 2014 September

Nielsen, N.; Churchill, C.; Kacprzak, G.; Murphy, M. MAGIICAT I. The Mg II Absorber-Galaxy Catalog ApJ 776 114 2013 October

Norris, M.; Kannappan, S.; Forbes, D.; et al. The AIMSS Project I: Bridging the Star Cluster – Galaxy Divide MNRAS 443 1151 2014 September

O’Donoghue, J.; Stallard, T.; Melin, H.; et al. Conjugate observations of Saturn’s northern and southern H3+ aurorae Icarus 229 214 2014 February

O’Rourke, J.; Knutson, H.; Zhao, M.; et al. Warm Spitzer and Palomar Near-IR Secondary Eclipse Photometry of Two Hot Jupiters: WASP-48b and HAT-P-23b ApJ 781 109 2014 February

Ofek, E.; Zoglauer, A.; Boggs, S.; et al. SN 2010jl: Optical to Hard X-Ray Observations Reveal an Explosion Embedded in a Ten Solar Mass Cocoon ApJ 781 42 2014 January

Ofek, E.; Arcavi, I.; Tal, D.; et al. Interaction-powered Supernovae: Rise-time versus Peak-luminosity Correlation and the Shock-breakout Velocity ApJ 788 154 2014 June

Ofek, E.; Sullivan, M.; Shaviv, N.; et al. Precursors Prior to Type IIn Supernova Explosions are Common: Precursor Rates, Properties, and Correlations ApJ 789 104 2014 July

Origlia, L.; Massari, D.; Rich, R.; et al. The Terzan 5 puzzle: discovery of a third, metal-poor component ApJ 779 L5 2013 December

Paganini, L.; DiSanti, M.; Mumma, M.; et al. The Unexpectedly Bright Comet C/2012 F6 (Lemmon) Unveiled at Near-infrared Wavelengths AJ 147 15 2014 January

Paganini, L.; Mumma, M.; Villanueva, G.; et al. C/2013 R1 (Lovejoy) at IR Wavelengths and the Variability of CO Abundances among Oort Cloud Comets ApJ 791 122 2014 August

Pan, Y.; Sullivan, M.; Maguire, K.; et al. The Host Galaxies of Type Ia Supernovae Discovered by the Palomar Transient Factory MNRAS 438 1391 2014 February


Pastorello, N.; Forbes, D.; Foster, C.; et al. The SLUGGS survey: Exploring the metallicity gradients of nearby early-type galaxies to large radii MNRAS 442 1003 2014 August

Patel, B.; McCully, C.; Jha, S.; et al. Three Gravitationally Lensed Supernovae behind CLASH Galaxy Clusters ApJ 786 9 2014 May

Penny, S.; Forbes, D.; Strader, J.; et al. Ultra compact dwarfs in the core of the Perseus Cluster: UCD formation via tidal stripping MNRAS 439 3808 2014 March

Perley, D.; Levan, A.; Tanvir, N.; et al. A Population of Massive, Luminous Galaxies Hosting Heavily Dust-obscured Gamma-Ray Bursts: Implications for the Use of GRBs as Tracers of Cosmic Star Formation ApJ 778 128 2013 December

Perley, D.; Cenko, S.; Corsi, A.; et al. The Afterglow of GRB 130427A from 1 to 1016 GHz ApJ 781 37 2014 January

Petigura, E.; Howard, A.; Marcy, G. Prevalence of Earth-size planets orbiting Sun-like stars PNAS 110 19273 2013 November

Prochaska, J.; Hennawi, J.; Lee, K.; et al. Quasars Probing Quasars VI. Excess HI Absorption Within One Proper Mpc of z~2 Quasars ApJ 776 136 2013 October

Prochaska, J.; Madau, P.; O’Meara, J.; Fumagalli, M. Towards a unified description of the intergalactic medium at redshift z ≈ 2.5 MNRAS 438 476 2014 February

Quimby, R.; Oguri, M.; More, A.; et al. Detection of the Gravitational Lens Magnifying a Type Ia Supernova Science 344 396 2014 April

Quintana, E.; Barclay, T.; Raymond, S.; et al. An Earth-Sized Planet in the Habitable Zone of a Cool Star Science 344 277 2014 April

Radigan, J.; Jayawardhana, R.; Lafrenière, D.; et al. Discovery of a Visual T-dwarf Triple System and Binarity at the L/T Transition ApJ 778 36 2013 November

Rafelski, M.; Neeleman, M.; Fumagalli, M.; et al. The Rapid Decline in Metallicity of Damped Lyα Systems at z~5 ApJ 782 L29 2014 February

Ram, R.; Brooke, J.; Bernath, P.; et al. Improved Line Data for the Swan System 12C13C Isotopologue ApJS 211 5 2014 March

Rappaport, S.; Swift, J.; Levine, A.; et al. M-Dwarf Fast Rotators and the Detection of Relatively Young Multiple M-Star Systems ApJ 788 114 2014 June

Rauch, M.; Becker, G.; Haehnelt, M.; Gauthier, J. Star-forming galactic contrails as a source of metal enrichment and ionizing radiation at high redshift MNRAS 441 73 2014 April

Rhoads, J.; Malhotra, S.; Richardson, M.; et al. The Dynamical Masses, Densities, and Star Formation Scaling Relations of Lyα Galaxies ApJ 780 20 2014 January

Rodney, S.; Riess, A.; Strolger, L.; et al. Type Ia Supernova Rate Measurements to Redshift 2.5 from CANDELS : Searching for Prompt Explosions in the Early Universe AJ 148 13 2014 July

Rodriguez, D.; Zuckerman, B.; Faherty, J.; Vican, L. A Dusty M5 Binary in the ß Pictoris Moving Group A&A 567 A20 2014 July

Romani, R.; Forman, W.; Jones, C.; et al. A Multi-wavelength Study of the Host Environment of SMBHB 4C+37.11 ApJ 780 149 2014 January

Rózanska, A.; Nikolajuk, M.; Czerny, B.; et al. Absorption features in the quasar HS 1603+3820 II. Distance to the absorber from photoionisation modelling New Astronomy 28 70 2014 April

Schaffenroth, V.; Geier, S.; Heber, U.; et al. Binaries discovered by the MUCHFUSS project. SDSS J162256.66+473051.1: An eclipsing subdwarf B binary with a brown dwarf companion A&A 564 A98 2014 April

Schaefer, G.; Prato, L.; Simon, M.; Patience, J. Orbital Motion in Pre-Main Sequence Binaries AJ 147 157 2014 June

Schenker, M.; Ellis, R.; Konidaris, N.; Stark, D. Contamination of Broad-Band Photometry by Nebular Emission in High Redshift Galaxies: Investigations with Keck’s MOSFIRE Near-Infrared Spectrograph ApJ 777 67 2013 November

Schlieder, J.; Bonnefoy, M.; Herbst, T.; et al. Characterization of the Benchmark Binary NLTT 33370 ApJ 783 27 2014 March

Schmidt, K.; Treu, T.; Brammer, G.; et al. Through the Looking GLASS: HST Spectroscopy of Faint Galaxies Lensed by the Frontier Fields Cluster MACSJ0717.5+3745 ApJ 782 L36 2014 February

Schneider, A.; Song, I.; Melis, C.; et al. The Nearby, Young, Isolated, Dusty Star HD 166191 ApJ 777 78 2013 November

Schulze, S.; Malesani, D.; Cucchiara, A.; et al. GRB 120422A/SN 2012bz: Bridging the Gap between Low- And High-Luminosity GRBs A&A 566 A102 2014 June

Shaw, M.; Filippenko, A.; Romani, R.; et al. Photometrically Triggered Keck Spectroscopy of Fermi BL Lacertae Objects AJ 146 127 2013 November

Shibuya, T.; Ouchi, M.; Nakajima, K.; et al. What is the Physical Origin of Strong Lyα Emission? II. Gas Kinematics and Distribution of Lyα Emitters ApJ 788 74 2014 June

Shih, H.; Stockton, A. The Three-dimensional Properties and Energetics of Radio-jet-driven Outflows ApJ 786 3 2014 May

Shivvers, I.; Mazzali, P.; Silverman, J.; et al. Nebular Spectroscopy of the Nearby Type IIb SN 2011dh MNRAS 436 3614 2013 December

Shporer, A.; O’Rourke, J.; Knutson, H.; et al. Atmospheric Characterization of the Hot Jupiter Kepler-13Ab ApJ 788 92 2014 June

Shuping, R.; Kassis, M.; Bally, J.; Morris, M. The curious morphology and orientation of Orion proplyd HST-10 ApJ 781 L37 2014 February

Silverman, J.; Vinko, J.; Kasliwal, M.; et al. SN 2000cx and SN 2013bh: extremely rare, nearly twin Type Ia supernovae MNRAS 436 1225 2013 December

Sokolovsky, K.; Schinzel, F.; Tanaka, Y.; et al. Two active states of the narrow-line gamma-ray-loud AGN GB 1310+487 A&A 565 A26 2014 May

Sonnenfeld, A.; Treu, T.; Gavazzi, R.; et al. The SL2S Galaxy-scale Lens Sample. IV. The Dependence of the Total Mass Density Profile of Early-type Galaxies on Redshift, Stellar Mass, and Size ApJ 777 98 2013 November

Sonnenfeld, A.; Gavazzi, R.; Suyu, S.; et al. The SL2S Galaxy-scale Lens Sample. III. Lens Models, Surface Photometry and Stellar Masses for the final sample ApJ 777 97 2013 November

Sromovsky, L.; Karkoschka, E.; Fry, P.; et al. Methane depletion in both polar regions of Uranus inferred from HST/STIS and Keck/NIRC2 observations Icarus 238 137 2014 August

Stanford, S.; Gonzalez, A.; Brodwin, M.; et al. The Massive and Distant Clusters of WISE Survey II: Initial Spectroscopic Confirmation of z ~ 1 Galaxy Clusters Selected from 10,000 Square Degrees ApJS 213 25 2014 August

Stockton, A.; Shih, H.; Larson, K.; Mann, A. A Search for Moderate-Redshift Survivors from the Population of Luminous Compact Passive Galaxies at High Redshift ApJ 780 134 2014 January

Stolte, A.; Hußmann, B.; Morris, M. R.; et al. The Orbital Motion of the Quintuplet Cluster – A Common Origin for the Arches and Quintuplet Clusters? ApJ 789 115 2014 July

Tan, X.; Payne, M.; Lee, M.; et al. Characterizing the Orbital and Dynamical State of the HD 82943 Planetary System with Keck Radial Velocity Data ApJ 777 101 2013 November

Tejos, N.; Morris, S.; Finn, C.; et al. On the connection between the intergalactic medium and galaxies: the H I–galaxy cross-correlation at z ≲ 1 MNRAS 437 2017 2014 January

Teske, J.; Cunha, K.; Schuler, S.; et al. Carbon and Oxygen Abundances in Cool Metal-rich Exoplanet Hosts: A Case Study of the C/O Ratio of 55 Cancri ApJ 778 132 2013 December

Teske, J.; Cunha, K.; Smith, V.; et al. C/O Ratios of Stars with Transiting Hot Jupiter Exoplanets ApJ 788 39 2014 June

Thöne, C.; Christensen, L.; Prochaska, J.; et al. The host of the SN-less GRB 060505 in high resolution? MNRAS 441 2034 2014 July

Todorov, K.; Luhman, K.; Konopacky, Q.; et al. A Search for Companions to Brown Dwarfs in the Taurus and Chamaeleon Star Forming Regions ApJ 788 40 2014 June

Tonnesen, S.; Cen, R. On the Reversal of SFR-Density Relation at z=1: Insights from Simulations ApJ 788 133 2014 June

Toshikawa, J.; Kashikawa, N.; Overzier, R.; et al. A First Site of Galaxy Cluster Formation: Complete Spectroscopy of a Protocluster at z=6.01 ApJ 792 15 2014 September

Tsai, C.; Turner, J.; Beck, S.; et al. The Circumnuclear Star Formation Environment of NGC 6946: Br γ and H2 Results from Keck Integral Field Spectroscopy ApJ 776 70 2013 October

Tumlinson, J.; Thom, C.; Werk, J.; et al. The COS-Halos Survey: Rationale, Design, and A Census of Circumgalactic Neutral Hydrogen ApJ 777 59 2013 November

Tummuangpak, P.; Bielby, R.; Shanks, T.; et al. The Very Large Telescope Lyman-Break Galaxy Redshift Survey - IV. Gas and galaxies at z ~ 3 in observations and simulations MNRAS 442 2094 2014 August

U, V.; Medling, A.; Sanders, D.; et al. The Inner Kiloparsec of Mrk 273 with Keck Adaptive Optics ApJ 775 115 2013 October

Usher, C.; Forbes, D.; Spitler, L.; et al. The SLUGGS Survey: Wide Field Imaging of the Globular Cluster System of NGC 4278 MNRAS 436 1172 2013 December

van der Laan, T.; Schinnerer, E.; Böker, T.; Armus, L. Near-infrared long-slit spectra of Seyfert galaxies: gas excitation across the central kiloparsec A&A 560 A99 2013 December

Van Dyk, S.; Zheng, W.; Fox, O.; et al. The Type IIb Supernova 2013df and Its Cool Supergiant Progenitor AJ 147 37 2014 February

Van Eylen, V.; Lund, M.; Silva Aguirre, V.; et al. What Asteroseismology can do for Exoplanets: Kepler-410A b is a Small Neptune around a Bright Star, in an Eccentric Orbit Consistent with Low Obliquity ApJ 782 14 2014 February

Vennes, S.; Kawka, A. The Polluted Atmosphere of the White Dwarf NLTT 25792 and the Diversity of Circumstellar Environments ApJ 779 70 2013 December

Virgili, F.; Mundell, C.; Pal’shin, V.; et al. GRB 091024A and the nature of ultra-long gamma-ray bursts ApJ 778 54 2013 November

Vogt, S.; Butler, R.; Rivera, E.; et al. A Four-planet System Orbiting The K0V Star HD 141399 ApJ 787 97 2014 June

Walker, E.; Mazzali, P.; Pian, E.; et al. Optical Follow-Up Observations of PTF10qts, a Luminous Broad-Lined Type Ic Supernova Found by the Palomar Transient Factory MNRAS 442 2768 2014 August

Wang, J.; Fischer, D.; Barclay, T.; et al. Planet Hunters. V. A Confirmed Jupiter-Size Planet in the Habitable Zone and 42 Planet Candidates from the Kepler Archive Data ApJ 776 10 2013 October

Wang, J.; Nardini, E.; Fabbiano, G.; et al. Fast and Furious: Shock Heated Gas as the Origin of Spatially Resolved Hard X-ray Emission in the Central 5 kpc of the Galaxy Merger NGC 6240 ApJ 781 55 2014 February

Werk, J.; Prochaska, J.; Tumlinson, J.; et al. The COS-Halos Survey: Physical Conditions and Baryonic Mass in the Low-redshift Circumgalactic Medium ApJ 792 8 2014 September

Wisnioski, E.; Glazebrook, K.; Blake, C.; Swinbank, A. Dust properties of clumpy disc galaxies at z ∼ 1.3 with Herschel-SPIRE MNRAS 436 266 2013 November

Woillez, J.; Wizinowich, P.; Akeson, R.; et al. First Faint Dual-field Off-axis Observations in Optical Long Baseline Interferometry ApJ 783 104 2014 March

Wold, I.; Barger, A.; Cowie, L. z ~ 1 Lyα Emitters. I. The Luminosity Function ApJ 783 119 2014 March

Wong, K.; Tran, K.; Suyu, S.; et al. Discovery of a Strong Lensing Galaxy Embedded in a Cluster at z = 1.62 ApJ 789 L31 2014 July

Wu, P.; Gal, R.; Lemaux, B.; et al. Star Formation Quenching in High-redshift Large-scale Structure: Post-starburst Galaxies in the Cl 1604 Supercluster at z ~ 0.9 ApJ 792 16 2014 September

Wuyts, E.; Rigby, J.; Gladders, M.; Sharon, K. A Magnified View of the Kinematics and Morphology of RCSGA 032727-132609: Zooming in on a Merger at z=1.7 ApJ 781 61 2014 February

Xu, S.; Jura, M.; Koester, D.; et al. Elemental Compositions of Two Extrasolar Rocky Planetesimals ApJ 783 79 2014 March

Yang, Y.; Walter, F.; Decarli, R.; et al. Pinpointing the Molecular Gas within an Lyα Blob at z ~ 2.7 ApJ 784 171 2014 April

Yelda, S.; Ghez, A.; Lu, J.; et al. Properties of the Remnant Clockwise Disk of Young Stars in the Galactic Center ApJ 783 131 2014 March

Zahid, H.; Dima, G.; Kudritzki, R.; et al. The Universal Relation of Galactic Chemical Evolution: The Origin of the Mass-Metallicity Relation ApJ 791 130 2014 August

Zheng, W.; Silverman, J.; Filippenko, A.; et al. The Very Young Type Ia Supernova 2013dy: Discovery, and Strong Carbon Absorption in Early-time Spectra ApJ 778 L15 2013 November

Zuckerman, B.; Vican, L.; Rodriguez, D. Accretion and OH Photodissociation at a Nearby T Tauri System in the beta Pictoris Moving Group ApJ 788 102 2014 June

Back page: The climate diversity of Hawaii Island is expressed beautifully in this shot of Waiaka Stream rushing to the Pacific Ocean with the splendor of fresh snow on Mauna Kea. Credit: Mark Devenot

The pueo (Hawaiian short-eared owl) can be fequenly observed soaring above the slopes of Mauna Kea. They are endemic to Hawaii. Credit: Mark Devenot

For more information contact:W. M. Keck Observatory65-1120 Mamalahoa HighwayKamuela, Hawai‘i 96743808.885.7887www.keckobservatory.org

2014 Annual Report - W. M. Keck Observatory · 2014 ANNUAL REPORT • W. M. KECK OBSERVATORY9 W. M....

Documents

Transcript of 2014 Annual Report - W. M. Keck Observatory · 2014 ANNUAL REPORT • W. M. KECK OBSERVATORY9 W. M....