Award Abstract # 1545949
PIRE: GROWTH: Global Relay of Observatories Watching Transients Happen

NSF Org: OISE
Office Of Internatl Science &Engineering
Recipient: CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
Initial Amendment Date: September 23, 2015
Latest Amendment Date: July 29, 2019
Award Number: 1545949
Award Instrument: Continuing Grant
Program Manager: Maija Kukla
mkukla@nsf.gov
 (703)292-4940
OISE
 Office Of Internatl Science &Engineering
O/D
 Office Of The Director
Start Date: October 1, 2015
End Date: September 30, 2020 (Estimated)
Total Intended Award Amount: $3,715,874.00
Total Awarded Amount to Date: $4,518,826.00
Funds Obligated to Date: FY 2015 = $926,988.00
FY 2016 = $1,683,852.00

FY 2017 = $90,000.00

FY 2018 = $900,386.00

FY 2019 = $917,600.00
History of Investigator:
  • Mansi Kasliwal (Principal Investigator)
    mansi@astro.caltech.edu
  • Thomas Prince (Co-Principal Investigator)
  • Shrinivas Kulkarni (Former Co-Principal Investigator)
Recipient Sponsored Research Office: California Institute of Technology
1200 E CALIFORNIA BLVD
PASADENA
CA  US  91125-0001
(626)395-6219
Sponsor Congressional District: 28
Primary Place of Performance: California Institute of Technology
CA  US  91125-1700
Primary Place of Performance
Congressional District:
28
Unique Entity Identifier (UEI): U2JMKHNS5TG4
Parent UEI:
NSF Program(s): PIRE- Prtnrshps Inter Res & Ed
Primary Program Source: 01001516DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT
01001617DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT

01001718DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT

01001819DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT

01001920DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT
Program Reference Code(s): 1207, 5905, 5919, 5921, 5924, 5936, 7566
Program Element Code(s): 1798, 7742
Award Agency Code: 4900
Fund Agency Code: 4900
Assistance Listing Number(s): 47.078, 47.079, 47.083

ABSTRACT

The Global Relay of Observatories Watching Transients Happen (GROWTH) program is an international collaborative network of astronomers and telescopes dedicated to the study of short-lived cosmic transients and near-earth asteroids. Cosmic transients are energetic flashes of light that are millions to billions of times the brightness of the sun, e.g. explosive deaths of massive stars, white dwarf detonations, exotic neutron star mergers and tidal disruption by black holes. Key follow-up observations of fast-fading or fast-moving events must occur at night promptly after discovery but before the sun rises. A relay of telescopes spanning multiple longitudes on earth will pass the baton amongst each other to effectively extend the night-time darkness. GROWTH will enable detailed monitoring of events that would otherwise vanish before the next night?s observations could begin at any single location. The torrent of data thus generated shall be used to improve both astronomical observing techniques and big data management and analysis (such as machine learning algorithms, database design and statistics). In addition, the intrinsically international context of the GROWTH program shall foster the development of relationships and social capital required to navigate effectively among diverse science cultures from around the world. Therefore, participating students will have the quantitative, computational and interpersonal skills to assume leadership roles in the knowledge economy.

GROWTH will address several frontier questions in time domain astronomy systematically. GROWTH aims to characterize the electromagnetic emission from binary neutron star mergers, thereby localizing the prime source of gravitational waves expected to be detected by the Advanced Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO). Timely spectroscopy may identify the long sought cosmic location of heavy element production. GROWTH would track small near-earth asteroids of the type that may pose hazards, to characterize their orbit, size, type and rotation properties. GROWTH shall have a front-row seat to observe the end points of stellar evolution by routinely obtaining data in the first 24 hours of a new-born supernova and directly probing the chemistry and history of the progenitor star. The GROWTH education program will train students and postdocs and encompass undergraduate course development, international internships, annual workshops and a research conference. GROWTH will thus help the US and international community prepare for the era of the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (starting 2022), NSF's highest priority ground-based astronomy project for the next decade.

PUBLICATIONS PRODUCED AS A RESULT OF THIS RESEARCH

Note:  When clicking on a Digital Object Identifier (DOI) number, you will be taken to an external site maintained by the publisher. Some full text articles may not yet be available without a charge during the embargo (administrative interval).

Some links on this page may take you to non-federal websites. Their policies may differ from this site.

(Showing: 1 - 10 of 142)
{Abbott}, B.~P. and {Abbott}, R. and {Abbott}, T.~D. and {Abernathy}, M.~R. and {Acernese}, F. and {Ackley}, K. and {Adams}, C. and {Adams}, T. and {Addesso}, P. and {Adhikari}, R.~X. and et al. "{Localization and Broadband Follow-up of the Gravitational-wave Transient GW150914}" \apjl , v.826 , 2016 , p.L13 10.3847/2041-8205/826/1/L13
{Cao}, Y. and {Johansson}, J. and {Nugent}, P.~E. and {Goobar}, A. and {Nordin}, J. and {Kulkarni}, S.~R. and {Cenko}, S.~B. and {Fox}, O.~D. and {Kasliwal}, M.~M. and {Fremling}, C. and {Amanullah}, R. and {Hsiao}, E.~Y. and {Perley}, D.~A. and {Bu "{Absence of Fast-moving Iron in an Intermediate Type Ia Supernova between Normal and Super-Chandrasekhar}" \apj , v.823 , 2016 , p.147 10.3847/0004-637X/823/2/147
{Ferretti}, R. and {Amanullah}, R. and {Goobar}, A. and {Johansson}, J. and {Vreeswijk}, P.~M. and {Butler}, R.~P. and {Cao}, Y. and {Cenko}, S.~B. and {Doran}, G. and {Filippenko}, A.~V. and {Freeland}, E. and {Hosseinzadeh}, G. and {Howell}, D.~A. "{Time-varying sodium absorption in the Type Ia supernova 2013gh}" \aap , v.592 , 2016 , p.A40 10.1051/0004-6361/201628351
{Gehrels}, N. and {Cannizzo}, J.~K. and {Kanner}, J. and {Kasliwal}, M.~M. and {Nissanke}, S. and {Singer}, L.~P. "{Galaxy Strategy for LIGO-Virgo Gravitational Wave Counterpart Searches}" \apj , v.820 , 2016 , p.136 10.3847/0004-637X/820/2/136
{Kasliwal}, M.~M. and {Cenko}, S.~B. and {Singer}, L.~P. and {Corsi}, A. and {Cao}, Y. and {Barlow}, T. and {Bhalerao}, V. and {Bellm}, E. and {Cook}, D. and {Duggan}, G.~E. and {Ferretti}, R. and {Frail}, D.~A. and {Horesh}, A. and {Kendrick}, R. a "{iPTF Search for an Optical Counterpart to Gravitational-wave Transient GW150914}" \apjl , v.824 , 2016 , p.L24 10.3847/2041-8205/824/2/L24
{Khazov}, D. and {Yaron}, O. and {Gal-Yam}, A. and {Manulis}, I. and {Rubin}, A. and {Kulkarni}, S.~R. and {Arcavi}, I. and {Kasliwal}, M.~M. and {Ofek}, E.~O. and {Cao}, Y. and {Perley}, D. and {Sollerman}, J. and {Horesh}, A. and {Sullivan}, M. an "{Flash Spectroscopy: Emission Lines from the Ionized Circumstellar Material around $\lt$10-day-old Type II Supernovae}" \apj , v.818 , 2016 , p.3 10.3847/0004-637X/818/1/3
{Kromer}, M. and {Fremling}, C. and {Pakmor}, R. and {Taubenberger}, S. and {Amanullah}, R. and {Cenko}, S.~B. and {Fransson}, C. and {Goobar}, A. and {Leloudas}, G. and {Taddia}, F. and {R{\"o}pke}, F.~K. and {Seitenzahl}, I.~R. and {Sim}, S.~A. an "{The peculiar Type Ia supernova iPTF14atg: Chandrasekhar-mass explosion or violent merger?}" \mnras , v.459 , 2016 , p.4428-4439 10.1093/mnras/stw962
{Ofek}, E.~O. and {Cenko}, S.~B. and {Shaviv}, N.~J. and {Duggan}, G. and {Strotjohann}, N.-L. and {Rubin}, A. and {Kulkarni}, S.~R. and {Gal-Yam}, A. and {Sullivan}, M. and {Cao}, Y. and {Nugent}, P.~E. and {Kasliwal}, M.~M. and {Sollerman}, J. and "{PTF13efv{\mdash}An Outburst 500 Days Prior to the SNHunt 275 Explosion and Its Radiative Efficiency}" \apj , v.824 , 2016 , p.6 10.3847/0004-637X/824/1/6
{Prentice}, S.~J. and {Mazzali}, P.~A. and {Pian}, E. and {Gal-Yam}, A. and {Kulkarni}, S.~R. and {Rubin}, A. and {Corsi}, A. and {Fremling}, C. and {Sollerman}, J. and {Yaron}, O. and {Arcavi}, I. and {Zheng}, W. and {Kasliwal}, M.~M. and {Filippen "{The bolometric light curves and physical parameters of stripped-envelope supernovae}" \mnras , v.458 , 2016 , p.2973-3002 10.1093/mnras/stw299
{Rubin}, A. and {Gal-Yam}, A. and {De Cia}, A. and {Horesh}, A. and {Khazov}, D. and {Ofek}, E.~O. and {Kulkarni}, S.~R. and {Arcavi}, I. and {Manulis}, I. and {Yaron}, O. and {Vreeswijk}, P. and {Kasliwal}, M.~M. and {Ben-Ami}, S. and {Perley}, D.~ "{Type II Supernova Energetics and Comparison of Light Curves to Shock-cooling Models}" \apj , v.820 , 2016 , p.33 10.3847/0004-637X/820/1/33
{Taddia}, F. and {Fremling}, C. and {Sollerman}, J. and {Corsi}, A. and {Gal-Yam}, A. and {Karamehmetoglu}, E. and {Lunnan}, R. and {Bue}, B. and {Ergon}, M. and {Kasliwal}, M. and {Vreeswijk}, P.~M. and {Wozniak}, P.~R. "{iPTF15dtg: a double-peaked Type Ic supernova from a massive progenitor}" \aap , v.592 , 2016 , p.A89 10.1051/0004-6361/201628703
(Showing: 1 - 10 of 142)

PROJECT OUTCOMES REPORT

Disclaimer

This Project Outcomes Report for the General Public is displayed verbatim as submitted by the Principal Investigator (PI) for this award. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this Report are those of the PI and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation; NSF has not approved or endorsed its content.

GROWTH stands for Global Relay of Observatories Watching Transients Happen. Our project brought together sixteen US and international institutions to build a joint network of telescope facilities.  Similar to a relay race, the longitudinal distribution of the telescopes enabled us to continuously collect astronomical data and beat sunrise at a single location. 

Together, we explored our dynamic Universe.  We studied fast-changing astronomical events such as supernovae, cosmic collisions, transients and fast-moving asteroids. For example, some transient flashes are brilliant but ephemeral and sometimes fade in a few hours. In this small window of opportunity, we collected data to study which elements were created in these energetic explosions.  

The GROWTH project commenced fifteen days before LIGO/Virgo detected gravitational waves from two merging black holes for the first time.  From the beginning, the GROWTH team worked in tandem with the LIGO/Virgo collaboration to study the dynamic universe (though at that time we did not know how often LIGO will register detections, whether any of them will light up the electromagnetic spectrum, and the two communities only had fledgling multi-messenger ideas). Five years later, GROWTH is a close-knit international community of time-domain astronomers with a well-developed, robust yet flexible workflow and technology that allows us to perform rapid multiwavelength multi-messenger follow up observations of cosmic transients. We just launched a modern successor to the GROWTH Marshal written in open source format called Fritz available on github.  

The GROWTH team has published 182 refereed journal publications over the past five years with an h-index of 42 and 7813 total citations so far. Indicative of the strong international collaborative network we have built, is the fact that ~70% of all GROWTH publications have at least two authors from partner institutions on different continents. Majority of the papers are led by early-career scientists, graduate students and postdoctoral fellows.   

Among the most cited papers, the journal Science published the GROWTH team's trio of papers on GW170817 (the first electromagnetic counterpart to a binary neutron star merger) as part of their ``2017 Breakthrough of the Year". Here, we presented a concordant, panchromatic picture of how an ultra-relativistic jet being stifled by a mildly relativistic cocoons self-consistently explains the GW170817 data across the electromagnetic spectrum. During the third gravitational wave observing run, the GROWTH team undertook systematic searches with three discovery engines (Zwicky Transient Facility, Dark Energy Camera and Palomar Gattini IR) and 18 follow-up ob- servatories. We concluded that given that the joint probability of detecting zero kilonovae was only 4%, the intrinsic luminosity function must be such that majority of events are fainter than GW170817.

Highlights from solar system studies include the discovery and characterization of two rare asteroids with orbits interior to the Earth's orbit, several near earth asteroids and follow-up of an interstellar visitor.

Highlights from supernova science span a systematic volume-limited search doubling the world sample of Calcium-rich gap transients, a strongly gravitationally lensed Type Ia supernova, a sub- Chandra Type Ia explosion triggered by a thick Helium shell, detailed studies of superluminous supernovae, detailed characterization of a luminous rapidly fading millimeter transient and electron capture supernova from a reddened progenitor in Messier 51.

An equally important goal of the project was to train the next generation of time-domain astronomers with a particular focus on building or further developing their skills to successfully conduct collaborative research on international and global scale. To that end, we ran a yearly GROWTH SURF program that sent US undergraduates to institutions within our international network for a summer research project. In addition, we had a continuously running exchange of young researchers who travelled to partner institutions for well-focused scientific projects that served both the purpose of training as well as sharing of expertise within the GROWTH network. Finally, in the last three years of the project we held hands-on summer schools on observational techniques for multi-wavelength follow up of transients. The content of the school was chosen specifically to cover an existing niche within the training of time-domain astronomers. 

We note that 60% of undergraduates in the GROWTH SURF program and 85% of the graduate students/postdocs who were part of the GROWTH exchange program have advanced their careers in astronomy/astrophysics. Due to COVID19, our final summer school where we teach hands-on data driven discovery had to transition to a virtual format. We received over 850 applications from over 80 countries. To reach out to more students as well as educators, we have made the materials from our summer schools freely available on our website at http://growth.caltech.edu/astronomy-school.html

While our NSF PIRE project has ended, the legacy of GROWTH lives on.


 

 


Last Modified: 01/29/2021
Modified by: Mansi M Kasliwal

Please report errors in award information by writing to: awardsearch@nsf.gov.

Print this page

Back to Top of page