Friday, July 12th was the exact midpoint between the start and end of NMSU Astrophysics I. Fittingly, our morning lecture introduced the “Baby Orbital Determination” project: a teaser version of our final project that utilizes what we’ve learned thus far. We went through how to determine the six orbital elements of an asteroid given its position and velocity relative to the sun.
So how do you know the position and velocity of an asteroid in 3-D if you only have three blurry, black-and-white pictures? This was the question we answered with Taylor expansions in the afternoon lecture. Well, we tried. By the time we got to the fourth derivative, the distance between my expression and the right edge of my page was getting smaller and smaller… while the writer on the whiteboard was getting longer and longer….
After an afternoon of staring at comically long derivatives, our cohort was in need of a break! We gathered at the volleyball court outside and–since we had no volleyball–battered each other with a soccer ball until it was long past dark. I went to bed with my brain grown and my glasses bent.
I’m Ori, a rising senior from Michigan who loves cats, matcha, and observational astronomy. Before attending SSP my favorite activity was ceramic wheel-throwing. Now my favorite activity is going to bed before 11 PM. It’s difficult but doable.
