Sad to be at a conference on this date because this event looks super interesting, and I already know of some awesome people who plan to attend. 🔭
10.03.2026 14:29
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Sad to be at a conference on this date because this event looks super interesting, and I already know of some awesome people who plan to attend. 🔭
look at the data. understand the data. learn about the instrument/telescope that got you the data
Wow, that really sucks. I'm really sorry for all of you.
And what you miss out on! So many cheeky easter eggs in astronomical data.
Stunning 🔭🪐
Right?? Just take a peek, there might be some other cool stuff you can find!
The best way to find something is to look for it.
Still as true as ever in the era of enormous surveys.
Look at the data. Like, in my case: gedit.
Absolutely. Especially in these days of 🔭 data pipelines, but we could generalize it to all science. 🧪
The Baryonic Mass-Halo Mass Relation of Extragalactic Systems
arxiv.org/abs/2603.06479
Instant classic new paper from @dalcantonjd.bsky.social and friends. First sentence: "The Universe is a very odd place filled with strange and wonderful things." ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2026ApJS... 🔭
and this goes beyond the financial aspect - it would also remove the tedious time spent deciphering cryptic bills, reading opaque policy documents, finding "in network" providers, on hold with hospitals and insurance companies, etc.
Today on the #arXiv:
Chow et al. 2026, "Predictions of Imminent Earth Impactors Discovered by LSST" - arxiv.org/abs/2603.05587.
Detailing how @vrubinobs.bsky.social will double the discovery rate of very small asteroids before they make harmless fireballs.
Accidentally timely given Koblenz‑Güls.
I support this 1000x. I would say *especially* for spectroscopy. If you don't look at the data, you just trust that other people make the same decisions you would, and you assume they are looking at the data (reader, we are not, unless you highlight a specific problem).
Yes! It is a quick lesson to learn* once you've wasted several days going down 7 calibration rabbit holes only to find in the spectral images that your target was in the wrong place, or had a companion, or whatever.
*IMO, but apparently not for everyone
Strong cosign! This is policy on my team. I also put a statement to this effect in nearly every paper.
I have become the tedious bore who, every time there's a question about something weird in our data, opens with "did you LOOK at the data?".
Step 1: Open that FITS file in DS9/python/whatever.
Take it from there. 🔭
I'm going to expand this statement to say that astronomers should actually look at their data whatever the format. Yes pipelines and high level science products are great, but you learn a lot from just spending some time exploring the counts-on-pixels images, even for spectroscopy. 🔭
Because “looking at images, not catalogs” is a dying pastime, the paper includes a tutorial on -how- to interpret images of galaxies. Qualitative information alone can get you a surprisingly long way towards a reasonable model, if you’re thinking through the links between morphology and physics.
thank you
I can barely express how much I loathed that Hegseth Iran video, but I had a bash
There Have Been No Approvals for New Transit Projects in the First Year of the Current Trump Administration
For the 1st time in the 1st year of a presidential administration since at least 1993, under Trump 2, the Federal Transit Administration signed 0 new contracts for major transit projects, like subways or light rail.
The US is facing a crisis of rail transit investment: www.urban.org/urban-wire/r...
"ELTI": a concept for using the Extremely Large Telescope as an optical interferometer. Enabled by advances in single-photon AD detector arrays, segmented sub-pupil beam combination and high-R spectroscopy. arxiv.org/abs/2603.05589 Yesss LFG 🔭 🔭 🔭
Also nice to see that major observatories are willing to give time to speculative searches for signatures of life, despite some astronomers claiming that the field is too conservative in its ambitions to search for life. 🔭
These authors went looking for technosignatures around (in)famous exoplanet K2-18b with 2 of the world's best radio interferometers. They found none, but cool work and great to highlight that these searches are happening. arxiv.org/abs/2602.09553 🔭
Great work 👏🔭
Open Lecturer in Planetary Science position at UCL Mullard Space Science Laboratory (Dorking) The successful applicant will be expected to perform research using data from the Rosalind Franklin Mission, but also other planetary bodies, such as the Moon and the Outer Planets icy moons. ☄️🔭🧪
chemical warfare
Important work - read the full thread
Looking forward to hearing about this & more from @profdanhicks.bsky.social w/@debssutton.bsky.social at the Lancaster History Lecture on March 18th
dukeslancaster.org/whats-on/the...