July – December 2015

You are here: Home Recent Papers July – December 2015

Multivariate approaches to classification in extragalactic astronomy
Didier Fraix-Burnet, Marc Thuillard and Asis K. Chattopadhyay

Clustering objects into synthetic groups is a natural activity of any science. Astrophysics is not an exception and is now facing a deluge of data. For galaxies, the one-century old Hubble classification and the Hubble tuning fork are still largely …

Disentangling Overlapping Astronomical Sources Using Spatial and Spectral Information
Jones, David E.; Kashyap, Vinay L.; van Dyk, David A.

We present a powerful new algorithm that combines both spatial information (event locations and the point-spread function) and spectral information (photon energies) to separate photons from overlapping sources. We use Bayesian statistical methods t …

Multiscale analysis of the gradient of linear polarization
Robitaille, J.-F.; Scaife, A. M. M.

We propose a new multiscale method to calculate the amplitude of the gradient of the linear polarization vector, |∇ P|, using a wavelet-based formalism. We demonstrate this method using a field of the Canadian Galactic Plane Survey and show that t …

Featureless classification of light curves
Kügler, S. D.; Gianniotis, N.; Polsterer, K. L.

In the era of rapidly increasing amounts of time series data, classification of variable objects has become the main objective of time-domain astronomy. Classification of irregularly sampled time series is particularly difficult because the data can …

Short versus long gamma-ray bursts: a comprehensive study of energetics and prompt gamma-ray correlations
Shahmoradi, Amir; Nemiroff, Robert J.

We present the results of a comprehensive study of the luminosity function, energetics, prompt gamma-ray correlations, and classification methodology of short-hard and long-soft gamma-ray bursts (GRBs), based on observational data in the largest cat …

Bayesian peak bagging analysis of 19 low-mass low-luminosity red giants observed with Kepler
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2015A%26A…579A..83C

Context. Non-radial oscillations, observed in thousands of red giants by the space missions CoRoT and Kepler, allow us to greatly improve our understanding of stellar structure and evolution in cool low-mass stars. The currently available Kepler lig …

A method for space-variant deblurring with application to adaptive optics imaging in astronomy
La Camera, A.; Schreiber, L.; Diolaiti, E.; Boccacci, P.; Bertero, M.; Bellazzini, M.; Ciliegi, P.

Context. Images from adaptive optics systems are generally affected by significant distortions of the point spread function (PSF) across the field of view, depending on the position of natural and artificial guide stars. Image reduction techniques c …

Characterizing cosmic inhomogeneity with anomalous diffusion
Kraljic, D.

Dark matter (DM) clustering at the present epoch is investigated from a fractal viewpoint in order to determine the scale where the self-similar scaling property of the DM halo distribution transits to homogeneity. Methods based on well-established …

Validation of Bayesian posterior distributions using a multidimensional Kolmogorov-Smirnov test
Harrison, Diana; Sutton, David; Carvalho, Pedro; Hobson, Michael

We extend the Kolmogorov-Smirnov (K-S) test to multiple dimensions by suggesting a R^n ⇒ [0,1] mapping based on the probability content of the highest probability density region of the reference distribution under consideration; this mapping reduc …

A robust determination of Milky Way satellite properties using hierarchical mass modelling
Martinez, Gregory D.

We introduce a new methodology to robustly determine the mass profile, as well as the overall distribution, of Local Group satellite galaxies. Specifically, we employ a statistical multilevel modelling technique, Bayesian hierarchical modelling, to …

Matching radio catalogues with realistic geometry: application to SWIRE and ATLAS
Fan, Dongwei; Budavári, Tamás; Norris, Ray P.; Hopkins, Andrew M.

Cross-matching catalogues at different wavelengths is a difficult problem in astronomy, especially when the objects are not point-like. At radio wavelengths, an object can have several components corresponding, for example, to a core and lobes. Cons …

Bayesian High-redshift Quasar Classification from Optical and Mid-IR Photometry
Richards, Gordon T.; Myers, Adam D.; Peters, Christina M.; Krawczyk, Coleman M.; Chase, Greg; Ross, Nicholas P.; Fan, Xiaohui; Jiang, Linhua; Lacy, Mark; McGreer, Ian D.; Trump, Jonathan R.; Riegel, Ryan N.

We identify 885,503 type 1 quasar candidates to i≲ 22 using the combination of optical and mid-IR photometry. Optical photometry is taken from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey-III: Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey (SDSS-III/BOSS), while mid-IR …

Unveiling the Milky Way: A New Technique for Determining the Optical Color and Luminosity of Our Galaxy
Licquia, Timothy C.; Newman, Jeffrey A.; Brinchmann, Jarle

We demonstrate a new statistical method of determining the global photometric properties of the Milky Way (MW) to an unprecedented degree of accuracy, allowing our Galaxy to be compared directly to objects measured in extragalactic surveys. Capitali …

Classifying X-Ray Binaries: A Probabilistic Approach
Gopalan, Giri; Dil Vrtilek, Saeqa; Bornn, Luke

In X-ray binary star systems consisting of a compact object that accretes material from an orbiting secondary star, there is no straightforward means to decide whether the compact object is a black hole or a neutron star. To assist in this process, …

Terrestrial Planet Occurrence Rates for the Kepler GK Dwarf Sample
Burke, Christopher J.; Christiansen, Jessie L.; Mullally, F.; Seader, Shawn; Huber, Daniel; Rowe, Jason F.; Coughlin, Jeffrey L.; Thompson, Susan E.; Catanzarite, Joseph; Clarke, Bruce D.; Morton, Timothy D.; Caldwell, Douglas A.; Bryson, Stephen T.; Haas, Michael R.; Batalha, Natalie M.; Jenkins, Jon M.; Tenenbaum, Peter; Twicken, Joseph D.; Li, Jie; Quintana, Elisa; Barclay, Thomas; Henze, Christopher E.; Borucki, William J.; Howell, Steve B.; Still, Martin

We measure planet occurrence rates using the planet candidates discovered by the Q1-Q16 Kepler pipeline search. This study examines planet occurrence rates for the Kepler GK dwarf target sample for planet radii, 0.75 ≤slant {R}{{p}} ≤slant 2.5 { …

Bayesian Inference of CMB Gravitational Lensing
Anderes, Ethan; Wandelt, Benjamin D.; Lavaux, Guilhem

The Planck satellite, along with several ground-based telescopes, has mapped the cosmic microwave background (CMB) at sufficient resolution and signal-to-noise so as to allow a detection of the subtle distortions due to the gravitational influence o …

Determining the Mass of Kepler-78b with Nonparametric Gaussian Process Estimation
Grunblatt, Samuel K.; Howard, Andrew W.; Haywood, Raphaëlle D.

Kepler-78b is a transiting planet that is 1.2 times the radius of Earth and orbits a young, active K dwarf every 8 hr. The mass of Kepler-78b has been independently reported by two teams based on radial velocity (RV) measurements using the HIRES and …

Testing Microvariability in Quasar Differential Light Curves Using Several Field Stars
de Diego, José A.; Polednikova, Jana; Bongiovanni, Angel; Pérez García, Ana M.; De Leo, Mario A.; Verdugo, Tomás; Cepa, Jordi

Microvariability consists of small timescale variations of low amplitude in the photometric light curves of quasars and represents an important tool to investigate their inner core. Detection of quasar microvariations is challenging because of their …

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly: Statistical quality assessment of SZ detections
Aghanim, N.; Hurier, G.; Diego, J.-M.; Douspis, M.; Macias-Perez, J.; Pointecouteau, E.; Comis, B.; Arnaud, M.; Montier, L.

We examine three approaches to the problem of source classification in catalogues. Our goal is to determine the confidence with which the elements in these catalogues can be distinguished in populations on the basis of their spectral energy distribu …

A Bayesian estimation of the helioseismic solar age
Bonanno, A.; Fröhlich, H.-E.

Context. The helioseismic determination of the solar age has been a subject of several studies because it provides us with an independent estimation of the age of the solar system. Aims: We present the Bayesian estimates of the helioseismic age of …