Kepler Conference

December 5-9, 2011 I was invited to attend the First ever Kepler Science Conference. Western New Mexico University paid for the trip since I am an adjunct Astronomy instructor. This was a great opportunity to rub shoulders with some of the greatest astronomy minds in the world. As a participant we were invited to either present a paper or poster. Since my work with the Central Stars of Planetary Nebula's still has a long way to go, I opted to present a poster. The poster abstract and poster was well received, though most participants in attendance were more interested in exoplanets as might be expected! Thanks to Tom Krajci and Dr. Jennifer Randall for their input and suggestions. Dr. Randall may be into the biological side of science but she sure knows how to do a mean poster!

Overall this was an experience of a lifetime. Much of the theory presented in Bruce Gary's book  (http://brucegary.net/book_EOA/EOA.pdf ) came to life and took on meaning through the talks and posters. The first two days were very technical and dealt with how a computer can detect an exoplanet from Kepler's signals. Computers are getting way better at this but it is still a very difficult process. The mid week talks on stars and cosmology and spin off from Kepler was very interesting and enlightening. One thing I found disturbing was the number of very bright young people, who have contributed extensively to the Kepler data interpretation efforts, that were there looking for a job!  Lots of funding drying up right now. 

Several things that were learned from this conference. My planetary nebula project should be done without UBVRI filtering! Kepler is good at finding milli-mags of variation without filters. Since all I need is the change in light, not actual filtered magnitudes then filtering is probably superfluous. Later this spring the concept will be seriously tested at TRO. Second, you can learn a lot about a star and system from it's light curve! This is an area that I definitely need to learn more about. Thirdly, it is important to understand and use good stellar modeling techniques. Lastly, I am not the brightest bulb in the pack, that is for sure! There are some really bright people out there eager to shine brightly! It was also obvious that there is a definite place for amateurs in astronomical science right now!

Addendum: My article that was written as I researched the Kepler poster (see below) was rejected by the JAAVSO! However, it is all for the best since I now have much more info on CSPN from the referee's comments. The research is still valid but I just did not run across several key journal articles that have been done in recent years. Hopefully, I will give it another go and this time may make it to publication!