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I am about to begin a PhD in astronomy. Until last month I was working at Caltech for 3 years on code which calculates orbits of asteroids to high precision. Th

I am about to begin a PhD in astronomy. Until last month I was working at Caltech for 3 years on code which calculates orbits of asteroids to high precision. This code is being used on several NASA telescopes now to predict when they will image known asteroids (NEO Surveyor, SphereX, maybe Roman eventually). I was allowed to open source it and I am planning on making it the basis of my PhD research: https://github.com/dahlend/kete https://github.com/dahlend/kete It can predict the location of the entire catalog of known asteroids to generally within the uncertainty of our knowledge of the orbits. Its core is written in rust, with a python frontend.

jxjnskkzxxhx 1y ago
Ever thought of making a presentation about this subject and putting it on YouTube? :-) It sounds really impressive.
- ddahlen 1y ago
  I've never really dabbled in youtube. I have several projects/papers I am working on using this code, I have thought about writing some blog posts as I publish those. But a PhD is going to be a major time sink, we will see what happens.
  - dang 1y ago
    Do you want to post it as a Show HN soon, before the PhD sucks you in altogether? (If so, email hn@ycombinator.com and we'll put it in the second-chance pool (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26998308 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26998308), so it will get a random placement on HN's front page.)
    - ddahlen 1y ago
      Thank you for the offer! Unfortunately the PhD has already sunk its claws in. I should have some flashy stuff to show off in a 2-3 months (I have a conference talk coming I have to prepare material for).
      - dang 1y ago
        Drat! Well, if you ever have some cycles to share your work on HN, contact us at hn@ycombinator.com and we'll be happy to help. More importantly, good luck with the PhD and we all hope it goes swimmingly!
      - kinow 1y ago
        Looking forward to it! Good luck with the PhD! (and thanks for making your code Open Source!)
Intralexical 1y ago
I like the daredevil asteroids going for the close dive of the star emoji sun :) Would it be appropriate to communicate on the README which telescopes this is used for? You see these very niche, very professional-looking repositories on GitHub now and then, and it's never clear how much credibility they have and whether they come from a hobbyist, student, experiment, or are in operational use.
physicles 1y ago
This sounds like an amazing project! I have a background in physics and ~20 years as a software engineer in the tech industry. Astronomy and astrophysics are so reliant on code these days; is there anywhere I could volunteer my expertise just to be a code monkey and help teams be more productive when working on software?

jxjnskkzxxhx 1y ago

Ever thought of making a presentation about this subject and putting it on YouTube? :-) It sounds really impressive.

ddahlen 1y ago
I've never really dabbled in youtube. I have several projects/papers I am working on using this code, I have thought about writing some blog posts as I publish those. But a PhD is going to be a major time sink, we will see what happens.
- dang 1y ago
  Do you want to post it as a Show HN soon, before the PhD sucks you in altogether? (If so, email hn@ycombinator.com and we'll put it in the second-chance pool (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26998308 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26998308), so it will get a random placement on HN's front page.)
  - ddahlen 1y ago
    Thank you for the offer! Unfortunately the PhD has already sunk its claws in. I should have some flashy stuff to show off in a 2-3 months (I have a conference talk coming I have to prepare material for).
    - dang 1y ago
      Drat! Well, if you ever have some cycles to share your work on HN, contact us at hn@ycombinator.com and we'll be happy to help. More importantly, good luck with the PhD and we all hope it goes swimmingly!
    - kinow 1y ago
      Looking forward to it! Good luck with the PhD! (and thanks for making your code Open Source!)

Intralexical 1y ago

I like the daredevil asteroids going for the close dive of the star emoji sun :) Would it be appropriate to communicate on the README which telescopes this is used for? You see these very niche, very professional-looking repositories on GitHub now and then, and it's never clear how much credibility they have and whether they come from a hobbyist, student, experiment, or are in operational use.

physicles 1y ago

This sounds like an amazing project! I have a background in physics and ~20 years as a software engineer in the tech industry. Astronomy and astrophysics are so reliant on code these days; is there anywhere I could volunteer my expertise just to be a code monkey and help teams be more productive when working on software?