Unusual Discovery by Students in HSU Program just as it is Featured in Sky and Telescope Magazine

High school students halfway across the Earth from Hardin-Simmons University are celebrating their discovery of an object so far away it is well past Pluto.

University, high school, and even junior high students from around the world have been discovering new asteroids every month since 2006, thanks to an international program run out of the Sid Richardson Science Complex at Hardin-Simmons University in Abilene, Texas. However, this latest discovery by students in Taiwan is different from the hundreds of other discoveries.

This newest find is the first trans-Neptunian object (TNO) ever observed by students participating in the International Asteroid Space Collaboration (IASC), which has traditionally discovered near-Earth objects (NEO).

“Some of the asteroids students have found are so close to Earth that they are considered new threats to our planet,” said Dr. Patrick Miller, co-founder and director of IASC and HSU professor of mathematics.

Operating out of a small office in the basement of the science building, Miller and the program are featured in the June 2014 Sky and Telescope magazine and the discovery comes just as the magazine hits the newsstands this month.

Five students at National Dali High School in Dali City, Taiwan, Republic of China, made the discovery last week as part of the Internet-based space-watching program. Over the Internet, participating schools receive astronomical images taken only hours before from several telescopes across the globe, encompassing the Astronomical Research Institute (Westfield, IL), Institute for Astronomy (Pan-STARRS, University of Hawaii), and Mt. Lemmon Sky Center (University of Arizona).

Students use a software package to assist in the detection and measurement of the positions of asteroids and other near-Earth objects. Discoveries of hundreds of previously unknown asteroids and even comets have been accrued and documented as a result of the program.

“Most of the discoveries are Main Belt asteroids, found between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter,” said Miller. “They are two to four times as far from the Sun as the Earth. Many are boulders of rock about a quarter-mile across.”

The newest discover is very different because it is at the furthest reaches of our Solar System, so far away said Miller that it would take about 562 Earth years for the TNO to go around the sun once.

“To give a comparison of the distance of this object, Pluto sits at an average distance of 40 AU* from the sun. The TNO’s orbit is still being determined but the preliminary orbit indicates it swings in a distance of 33 AU from the Sun out to 97 AU. The odd orbit suggests that it interacted with Neptune in the past, which disturbed its orbit into the shape that we see today,” said Miller.

The students discovered the TNO with images downloaded in April from the Institute for Astronomy in Haleakala, Maui, which has the world’s largest scientific camera, a 7-degree field of vision and 1.4 billion pixels.

IASC (pronounced Isaac), now in its eighth year, was co-founded by Miller and Jeff Davis, an HSU student at the time and now alumnus, with just five schools from the United States participating. IASC has since grown to 500 schools with 5,000 students participating each year in more than 70 countries on six continents.

The objective of the space program is two-fold: to keep an eye out for objects in space that could be potentially dangerous to Earth, and to prepare young scientists for future endeavors said Miller.

One of the most productive months for IASC was in March 2012 when students discovered 20 new asteroids, a record number in one month. Discoveries included one made by an 11-year-old middle school student in Portugal and two local students at Cisco College in Abilene. Two previous asteroids discovered by HSU students were finalized and cataloged that same month by the Minor Planet Center, located at Harvard University, and have since been named by the students.

One of IASC’s key volunteers, Tomas Vorobjov, Slovakia, discovered a comet in his work to support the student-based discovery programs. Miller describes Vorobjov’s sighting as a major discovery considering the comet, like the TNO, is so far away.

“From Space to School, An International Collaboration Puts Asteroid Hunting in the Hands of Students,” can be found in the June 2014 Sky and Telescope on newsstands now.

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Astronomical Unit (AU) is the average distance between Earth and the Sun, which is about 93 million miles or 150 million kilometers. Astronomical units are usually used to measure distances within our Solar System.

HSU’s IASC is a collaboration of:

• Lawrence Hall of Science (University of California, Berkeley)
• Astronomical Research Institute (Westfield, IL)
• Global Hands-On Universe Association (Lisbon, Portugal)
• Sierra Stars Observatory Network (Markleeville, CA)
• Tarleton State University (Stephenville, TX)
• Yerkes Observatory (University of Chicago)
• National Astronomical Observatories of China (Beijing, China)
• Pan-STARRS (Institute for Astronomy, University of Hawaii)
• Faulkes Telescopes Project (Wales)
• Yerkes Observatory (Williams Bay, WI)
• Western Kentucky University (Bowling Green, KY)
• Astronomers Without Borders (Calabasas, CA)
• Astrometrica (H. Raab, Austria)