J/ApJ/792/30 NEOWISE magnitudes for near-Earth objects (Mainzer+, 2014)
Initial performance of the NEOWISE reactivation mission.
Mainzer A., Bauer J., Cutri R.M., Grav T., Masiero J., Beck R.,
Clarkson P., Conrow T., Dailey J., Eisenhardt P., Fabinsky B.,
Fajardo-Acosta S., Fowler J., Gelino C., Grillmair C., Heinrichsen I.,
Kendall M., Kirkpatrick J.D., Liu F., Masci F., McCallon H., Nugent C.R.,
Papin M., Rice E., Royer D., Ryan T., Sevilla P., Sonnett S., Stevenson R.,
Thompson D.B., Wheelock S., Wiemer D., Wittman M., Wright E., Yan L.
<Astrophys. J., 792, 30 (2014)>
=2014ApJ...792...30M 2014ApJ...792...30M (SIMBAD/NED BibCode)
ADC_Keywords: Minor planets ; Comets ; Photometry, infrared ; Surveys
Keywords: comets: general - infrared: general -
minor planets, asteroids: general - space vehicles - surveys
Abstract:
NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) spacecraft has been
brought out of hibernation and has resumed surveying the sky at 3.4
and 4.6 µm. The scientific objectives of the NEOWISE reactivation
mission are to detect, track, and characterize near-Earth asteroids
and comets. The search for minor planets resumed on 2013 December 23,
and the first new near-Earth object (NEO) was discovered 6 days later.
As an infrared survey, NEOWISE detects asteroids based on their
thermal emission and is equally sensitive to high and low albedo
objects; consequently, NEOWISE-discovered NEOs tend to be large and
dark. Over the course of its three-year mission, NEOWISE will
determine radiometrically derived diameters and albedos for ∼2000 NEOs
and tens of thousands of Main Belt asteroids. The 32 months of
hibernation have had no significant effect on the mission's
performance. Image quality, sensitivity, photometric and astrometric
accuracy, completeness, and the rate of minor planet detections are
all essentially unchanged from the prime mission's post-cryogenic
phase.
Description:
Regular survey operations, including the moving object processing
pipeline, began on 2013 December 23; the first new NEO was discovered
6 days later. The NEOWISE operational cadence remains identical to
that employed during the prime mission (Wright et al. 2010AJ....140.1868W 2010AJ....140.1868W;
Heinrichsen & Wright 2006SPIE.6270E..1CH). The telescope scans
continuously along great circles with approximately constant ecliptic
longitude, while a scan mirror freezes the sky on the focal planes for
9.9 s and returns to its starting position 1.1 s later. While the sky
is fixed on the focal planes, simultaneous exposures are collected in
the W1 and W2 bands through the use of beamsplitters every 11 s with
an exposure time of 7.7 s. Based on its present rate of NEO
observations, over the course of its three year mission, NEOWISE is
expected to observe ∼2000 NEOs, roughly 700-800 of which will be
detected in single-exposure images, with the remainder being
recoverable through stacking.
File Summary:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
FileName Lrecl Records Explanations
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
ReadMe 80 . This file
table2.dat 84 59 Thermal Fit Results for the NEO Detections
Reported in this Work
table1.dat 51 806 Preliminary NEOWISE magnitudes for the NEOs
shown in Figure 15 at each observation's
modified Julian date
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
See also:
II/311 : WISE All-Sky Data Release (Cutri+ 2012)
J/A+A/375/285 : Photometric observations of 9 Near-Earth Objects (Szabo+, 2001)
J/ApJ/743/156 : NEOWISE observations of NEOs: preliminary results
(Mainzer+, 2011)
J/ApJ/760/L12 : WISE/NEOWISE NEOs preliminary thermal fits (Mainzer+, 2012)
J/ApJ/784/110 : NEOWISE observations of 105 near-Earth objects (Mainzer+, 2014)
Byte-by-byte Description of file: table2.dat
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bytes Format Units Label Explanations
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1- 7 A7 --- Name Identifier
9- 18 A10 --- OName Other name
20- 24 F5.2 mag H H magnitude
26- 29 F4.2 -- G Phase curve slope parameter
31- 35 F5.3 km D Diameter
37- 41 F5.3 km e_D rms uncertainty on D
43- 47 F5.3 --- pV Visible albedo
49- 53 F5.3 --- e_pV rms uncertaitny on pV (1)
55- 59 F5.3 --- eta Beaming parameter
61- 65 F5.3 --- e_eta rms uncertaitny on eta (1)
67- 71 F5.3 --- pIR Infrared albedo
73- 77 F5.3 --- e_pIR rms uncertaitny on pIR (1)
79- 80 I2 --- NobsW1 Number of observations in NEOWISE W1 band
82- 84 I3 --- NobsW2 Number of observations in NEOWISE W2 band
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note (1): The 1σ errors presented here were statistically generated using
Monte Carlo modeling. NEOWISE magnitudes, absolute magnitude H, and G were
varied by their 1σ error bars, as well as beaming (eta) and pIR when
these two parameters could not be fit. The statistical errors on diameter and
pV for each object in the table should be added in quadrature to the
systematic errors described in the text and discussed in Mainzer et al.
(2012ApJ...745....7M 2012ApJ...745....7M).
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Byte-by-byte Description of file: table1.dat
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bytes Format Units Label Explanations
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1- 7 A7 --- Name Identifier
9- 21 F13.7 d MJD Modified Julian Date of observation
23 A1 --- l_3.4mag The 2σ upper limit flag on 3.4mag (1)
25- 30 F6.3 mag 3.4mag NEOWISE 3.4 micron band magnitude
32- 36 F5.3 mag e_3.4mag ? Uncertainty in 3.4mag
38- 43 F6.3 mag 4.6mag NEOWISE 4.6 micron band magnitude
45- 49 F5.3 mag e_4.6mag Uncertainty in 4.6mag
51 I1 --- FAper [0] flag for aperture radius used for
photometry (2)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note (1): See Cutri et al. 2012, cat II/311
(http://wise2.ipac.caltech.edu/docs/release/allsky/expsup/).
Note (2): Flag for aperture radius as follows:
0 = pipeline profile fit photometry was used.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
History:
From electronic version of the journal
(End) Prepared by [AAS], Tiphaine Pouvreau [CDS] 05-Apr-2017