HowCanCulturalDiversityImproveSerendipitousDiscovery?

ByGordonMacLeod

Serendipity• accident

• Unexpectedresult• Unprecedentedresult

• luckAccidental

Tombaugh - 1930

UnexpectedJansky - 1933

UnprecedentedBell - 1967

A Simple Experiment

Hypothesis– ExcitedOHmasersarerarebecausetheyarevariable

Experiment– multipleepochsof100OHmasers

Results– newdetectionssuggestivebutmustmodifyhypothesis

Experiment– monitormaserstoseehowlongtheylive

−14 −12 −10 −8 −60

10

20

30

40

50

Flux

dens

ity(J

y/po

l)

6031 MHz OH

Spectra on:5-Jul-12 RCP5-Jul-12 LCP8-Sep-15 RCP8-Sep-15 LCP

−14 −12 −10 −8 −6Vlsr (km s−1)

0

25

50

75

100

125

150

175

200Fl

uxde

nsity

(Jy/

pol)

6035 MHz OH

Spectra on:13-Dec-13 RCP13-Dec-13 LCP8-Aug-15 RCP8-Aug-15 LCP

A Lucky Discovery

Result of LuckNew

Kitty Visited by Aliens?1665 MHz OH

LSD needed

ALIENS?

NO!

Interesting G351 in 4660MHz OH

-2

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

-10 -5 0 5

S [J

y]

Velocity (lsr) [km/s]

7-Nov-15

y = 0.0002x - 3.2881R² = 0.96339

y = -0.0001x - 1.7221R² = 0.32504

-2.76

-2.66

-2.56

-2.46

-2.36

-2.26

-2.16

-2.06

5000 5500 6000 6500 7000 7500

Velo

city

[km

/s]

JD - 2450000

Twocomponentsdriftingapart

SuggestoriginduringHartRAO

repair

Spectroscopy at HartRAO• 18cm(1.6GHz)• 1612,1665/7,1720MHzOH

• 5&6cm(4.8– 6.1GHz)• 4660,4750,4765,6016,6030/5,6049MHzOH

• 4.5cmMethanolreceiver• 6.7GHzCH3OH

• 2.5cm(12GHz)• 12.2GHzCH3OH

• 1.3cm(22.2GHz)• 22.2GHzH2O,23.1GHzCH3OH,NH3lines

• Alldualpolarisation &only12GHznotcryogenic• 1024channelspectrometer(0.125– 32.0MHz)

BUT CAN USE ONLY ONE RECEIVER AT A TIME INEFFICIENT!

Different Solutions to the Same Problem

How do I eat without using my hands?

Chop sticks

Forks

Cultural diversityoffers new

prospectives

Increase Serendipitous Discoveries?Needto:• Increaseno.ofsourcesobserved• Increasecadenceofobservations• Increaseno.oftransitionsmonitored/source

Nice Kitty

FORK:• Broadband,&digitise at,receiver• Betterbackends

CHOPSTICKS:• Coordinatetelescopes

Preferablyboth!

IAUS336: MASER Monitoring Org (M2O)

• FormationofanetworkofMASERmonitoringtelescopes:

• Functions:• Providecalibrationandconfirmationservicestoeach• Createcatalogueofinterestingandmonitoredsources• Developtriggeringmethodologies• Operateasa24hourmonitoringservicewhenrequired• Informotherfacilitiesofinterestingphenomena• Providefastfollow-upobservationservices.

• Longerterm• Providemulti-wavelengthmonitoring,

• millimeter,optical/IR,etc.

• Countriesrepresented:Australia,Canada,China,France,Germany,Italy,Japan,Korea,Latvia,Poland,Russia,SouthAfrica,Thailand,USA

NoBrazilorIndiayet

Early Success of M2O

Before

After

Crimea 22 RTDiscovered

HartRAOConfirmed

Super-burst water masers:• Short-lived• Very intense• Hard to confirm

Triggered follow-up observations:• ToO SMA observations• ToO EVN/VLBA proposals

submitted• Shared monitoring data• All within 10 days of discovery

Culturaldiversityleadsnaturallytonewideas.

Howcanweutilise toincreaseserendipitousdiscovery?

Cooperation,Coordination,&Collaboration