Community Access at Ritter Observatory

Spectroscopic service observing Student training Public data archive

With support from the NSF-PREST program,* Ritter is committed to making 25% of its usable observing time available to the astronomical community.

Ritter Observatory performs spectroscopic service observing on behalf of the astronomical research community. Requests for observations in support of student theses, for monitoring series on a particular star or stars, and for observations in support of other observatories, whether ground-based or spaceborne, are especially welcome. Requests are welcome at any time and can usually be accommodated within 24 hours if necessary, weather permitting.

To request spectroscopic service observations, send email to Nancy Morrison or Karen Bjorkman specifying:

• Object(s)
• Spectral resolution (normally R = 6,000 or 26,000; see the instrumentation page for options)
• Signal-to-noise ratio
• Wavelength range. The region around Hα is easiest for us to reach at present, with either spectrograph.
• Observation frequency and duration (if monitoring series)

Evening visits or field trips by small classes are invited. Please contact Nancy Morrison to make arrangements.

Ritter will train undergraduate and graduate students in telescope operation and in spectroscopic observing techniques and data reduction and analysis. Because our NSF funding has expired, individual training visits will no longer be conducted, unless a prior commitment has been made. Prior commitments will be honored.

• Individual training visits will last one to two weeks. Lodging will be in a nearby hotel during the academic year or in on-campus student housing during the summer. Funding to support students' lodging expense is available. Up to four students can be accommodated at the telescope at a time.
• On each usable night, students will spend all night at the telescope with a Toledo faculty member or a senior Ph.D. student, participating in normal in-house and service observing programs. Students will:
  • Improve their understanding of celestial coordinates and the sky
  • Learn techniques of operation of a professional telescope
  • Become familiar with observatory operations, including the normal precautions that observatories take against adverse environmental conditions
• On cloudy nights, students will learn data reduction and analysis with IRAF under the supervision of a faculty member or a senior Ph.D. student. For students who do not need to learn IRAF, other software is also available. Concepts covered will be tailored to the needs of the students, but they may include:
  • Principles of operation of CCDs
  • Concepts of spectroscopy such as the instrument profile and spectral resolution
  • Error analysis of equivalent width and radial velocity measurements
  • Characteristics of Ritter data as needed to carry out further analysis
  • Introduction to the reduction of raw data

For a photo album from recent training sessions, click here.

For a printable flier describing the program, click here.

To apply for training, students are invited to provide by email or post

• A letter giving
• Objective for the training
• Desired time frame for the visit; provide second and third choices, if possible
• Description of planned research project, if the objective is to undertake research
• Description of future career plans
• Intended use of Ritter data archives, if any
• A transcript - official or unofficial - of previous college or university course work
• A supporting letter from a mentor or research advisor, mailed separately

Address for email applications: Nancy Morrison or Karen Bjorkman

Address for applications by post:

On-line public archive of spectroscopic data

Ultimately, it will contain links to data in the public archive, which contains reduced spectra in FITS format, including spectra of

• Telluric standard stars, mostly rapidly-rotating A- and B-type main-sequence stars
• Artificial template spectra for telluric line removal
• Radial-velocity standard stars, mostly K-type giants
• Chromospherically active stars
• Selected hot emission-line stars
• Novae and symbiotic stars

^*This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. AST-0440784. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.