Speaker
Description
The next generation of astronomical surveys will revolutionize our understanding of the Universe, raising unprecedented data challenges in the process. One of them is the impossibility to rely on human scanning for the identification of unusual/unpredicted astrophysical objects. Moreover, given that most of the available data will be in the form of photometric observations, such characterization cannot rely on the existence of high resolution spectroscopic observations.
The goal of this project is to detect the anomalies in the Open Supernova Catalog with use of machine learning. We develop a pipeline where human expertise and modern machine learning techniques can complement each other. Using supernovae as a case study, our proposal is divided in two parts: a first developing a strategy and pipeline where anomalous objects are identified, and a second phase where such anomalous objects submitted to careful individual analysis. The strategy requires an initial data set for which spectroscopic is available for training purposes, but can be applied to a much larger data set for which we only have photometric observations. This project represents an effective strategy to guarantee we shall not overlook exciting new science hidden in the data we fought so hard to acquire.
