Questions tagged [gaia]

Questions about the space observatory GAIA.

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Period-Luminosity Relation of Cepheids via Gaia Data

I was trying to verify Leavitt's Law of Period Luminosity Relationships of Cepheid Variables using Gaia data. To do this I calculated the period using the Lomb Scargle Periodogram for 1450 stars and ...
Ambica Govind's user avatar
1 vote
0 answers
44 views

Filtered Gaia DR3 datasets

I'm a programmer who'd like to process some of the smaller Gaia DR3 datasets. I ultimately want to use the Gaia Sky 15M default dataset, but decided to start with a smaller 1.9M dataset as a prototype....
aggregate1166877's user avatar
1 vote
1 answer
79 views

How to get star position from the Gaia data set?

I’m trying to recreate the Milky Way as a particle system inside Houdini, and I wanted to explore using the Gaia data as a starting point. I’ve downloaded an example source file from the data set but ...
kinkersnick's user avatar
1 vote
0 answers
19 views

Using Gaia Passbands with L_nu coordinates

I am trying to find the coordinates of my bundles of gas on the gaia ($G, G_{bp}-G_{rp}$) hr diagram. I have its spectrum in $\nu L_\nu$ coordinates. Thus far, my attempts have mainly been to ...
Berkin's user avatar
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2 votes
1 answer
75 views

Unusual amount of white dwarfs in star clusters in my analysis

I'm trying to plot H-R Diagrams of open clusters using data from Gaia DR3. My workflow is something like this: Plot apparent magnitude vs log(distance) in pc. An overdensity would indicate the ...
Ambica Govind's user avatar
1 vote
0 answers
49 views

How do nuJ(nu) units work?

I'm working with (Nublado) Cloudy, which is essentially a spectral modelling tool for stellar matter. Using the software, I model my own stellar object and obtain its continuum. According to Hazy, ...
Berkin's user avatar
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3 votes
1 answer
49 views

How do you use Gaia Passbands to find Gbp-Grp Coordinates?

I've never used Gaia passbands, or any type of passbands before for that matter. I have a theoretical model of a stellar object, and its corresponding emissions as a function of wavelength. I'd like ...
Berkin's user avatar
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0 votes
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15 views

How to get target_id column from GAIA DR3 basic search?

When using the GAIA search through the website, the target_id column seems to pop up without any displayed column specified and disappears just as mysteriously. Does anybody know how to trigger that ...
ahni's user avatar
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3 votes
1 answer
271 views

True masses of exoplanets from Gaia

At Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methods_of_detecting_exoplanets#Space_telescopes it says "The Gaia mission, launched in December 2013, will use astrometry to determine the true masses ...
sno's user avatar
  • 919
2 votes
1 answer
138 views

How can I get a list of the closest x stars and their distances from the Gaia ESA Archive using Python?

I've been trying to find this out for a while now, but I'm making zero progress. I really struggle to find good documentation for the query language, and even in the astroquery library I can't find ...
Outis Nemo's user avatar
2 votes
0 answers
59 views

Computing the sky coordinates using astropy

I need your help with an error I have been receiving while trying to obtain the sky coordinates using astropy module in python. The code looks like the following, ...
CTZenScientist's user avatar
1 vote
1 answer
84 views

Which catalogue has identified objects from Gaia DR3?

I am trying to match objects from a Gaia DR3 dataset having 1 million rows with simbad. I find it difficult to find object type for all the rows as queries using astroquery becomes insanely slow after ...
VADeR's user avatar
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1 vote
1 answer
133 views

How do I get cross-verification data for Gaia DR3?

I've collected data having 1 million rows of Gaia DR3. I am trying to make a dataset suitable for Machine Learning. I need a target variable which is the stellar object type. My issue is I can't seem ...
VADeR's user avatar
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1 vote
1 answer
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Classifying stars using GEDR3

Is there a way to take the Gaia Early Data Release 3 dataset and calculate a likely star size (radius and mass) (units not relevant), and emission spectra (hydrogen, helium) or light color? Please ...
GrasshopperTaji's user avatar
2 votes
1 answer
77 views

Need help in writing a query using ADQL (Astronomical Data Query Language)

I am trying to query Gaia archive to get the medium quality sample as mentioned in Reico-Blanco et al. (2022) Gaia Data Release 3: Chemical cartography of the Milky Way. The idea is to query the ...
CTZenScientist's user avatar
2 votes
1 answer
76 views

What criteria determines whether stars are supernova type II candidates?

I want to find supernova candidates by using the Gaia catalog in 300 parsec (near Earth). I though they must be red super giants so they are cooler than 4100 K and more luminous than 104 solar ...
Aegean's user avatar
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1 answer
92 views

What is the goal of predicting gravitational microlensing?

I know that gravitational lensing is a geometric effect that occurs when light changes direction because a massive object causes space-time to warp and consequently the radiation rays change the path ...
Lujan's user avatar
  • 153
5 votes
1 answer
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How many stars can we resolve?

Wikipedia estimates the number of stars in the Milky Way at 100 to 400 billion. One of our most ambitious astrometry projects, Gaia, has been able to resolve and map almost 2 billion stars in the ...
Connor Garcia's user avatar
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5 votes
1 answer
117 views

Is there a simple way to get $T_{\mathit{eff}}$ estimates for Gaia EDR3?

For just hobbyist purposes (3D starmap) - I'm trying to infer temperature from EDR3 data to make a rough assessment of stellar type. I tried applying figure 2 from this doc: https://arxiv.org/pdf/1008....
user25153's user avatar
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6 votes
2 answers
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How can I convert a GAIA-magnitude "G" to Johnson "V"?

Question: How can I convert the Gaia-magnitude G (and G_ESTIMATE) into a V-magnitude? The solution probably can be found in the Gaia Data Release Documentation for Gaia's EDR3 ("Early Data ...
CR131873's user avatar
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2 votes
2 answers
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Downloadable GCNS (Gaia Catalog of Nearby Stars)

Has Gaia made the "Gaia Catalog of Nearby Stars" (GCNS) available for offline processing? Ideally I'd like the full 100pc data set in a format that doesn't require any specialized libraries ...
BCS's user avatar
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1 vote
1 answer
58 views

How many asteroids were discovered via GAIA? Is there a list?

The ESA Science & Technology video Gaia's asteroid discoveries shows trajectories for hundreds of asteroids that were seen by GAIA, but as far as I can deduce from the extensive notes there, only ...
uhoh's user avatar
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3 votes
1 answer
1k views

Query Gaia by star name

I am attempting to query Gaia programmatically in python to get certain properties for specific stars. I can write a query which obtains some properties, but only for all stars, not a set of stars or ...
Random_Astro_Student's user avatar
2 votes
1 answer
132 views

Extracting specific star data from Gaia DR2?

I would like to extract all Gaia DR2 sources which have six-parameter solutions as well as their radial velocities and effective temperatures. Is this possible as DR2 only specifies that there are 1,...
WarpPrime's user avatar
  • 6,613
2 votes
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40 views

Did Gaia DR3 help figure out whether Albireo is an optical double?

Based on the Wikipedia page of Albireo, Gaia DR2 had too much noise to determine whether the stars are physically associated or if they are just an optical double. Gaia DR3 was released last year. ...
usernumber's user avatar
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1 vote
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181 views

Relationships between G magnitude, Johnson V magnitude, and spectral type of stars?

I'm simulating a population of binary stars for a summer research project. I'm adding uncertainties to my simulated observables such as angular position and radial (line of sight) velocity. I'm using ...
Sofia Splawska's user avatar
2 votes
1 answer
115 views

What was the first use of time-delay integration in Astronomy? Are there instances before GAIA?

In the context of GAIA, time-delay integration is the clocking of a CCD's charge shift register at a frequency such that it matches the linear speed across the focal plane of the actual image. So even ...
uhoh's user avatar
  • 31.4k
2 votes
1 answer
777 views

Query with Gaia: I have a list of 1000+ source_id's. How do I find the associated stars and their data?

I have a table of around 1700 source id's from gaiadr2 (in csv format). I would like to see the data that Gaia has for each star in a new table. I'm really struggling to figure out how to do this ...
Joshua Yielding's user avatar
3 votes
1 answer
192 views

Is GAIA the only game in town for looking at quadrupole gravitational deflection of light?

From Gerry Gilmore (2018) Gaia: 3-dimensional census of the Milky Way Galaxy 4.4 Fundamental physics Relativistic effects are highly significant for Gaia measurement accuracy, with tests of General ...
uhoh's user avatar
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6 votes
1 answer
260 views

Has GAIA learned anything about General Relativity looking near Jupiter? (Gerry Gilmore: "oblate rotating mass moving in a deeper (Solar) potential")

From Gerry Gilmore (2018) Gaia: 3-dimensional census of the Milky Way Galaxy 4.4 Fundamental physics Relativistic effects are highly significant for Gaia measurement accuracy, with tests of General ...
uhoh's user avatar
  • 31.4k
10 votes
2 answers
1k views

Why (the heck) is the basic angle of GAIA 106.5°?

This answer to Why does the Gaia space telescope have two main mirrors says: According to the GAIA FAQs which does an excellent job: http://www.cosmos.esa.int/web/gaia/faqs: Why is there an angle of ...
uhoh's user avatar
  • 31.4k
3 votes
1 answer
137 views

What would "the next GAIA"-like instrument be like? Could it simply be a 3 to 5x scaled-up version of the same beautiful system?

This excellent, thorough and well-sourced answer to Has a gravitational microlensing event ever been predicted? If so, has it been observed? mentions several works where hundreds to thousands of ...
uhoh's user avatar
  • 31.4k
1 vote
0 answers
33 views

How to explain tidal tails and dark matter sub-halos in simple terms?

There is the exciting news by ESA entitled Is the nearest star cluster to the Sun being destroyed? Data from ESA’s Gaia star mapping satellite have revealed tantalising evidence that the nearest ...
B--rian's user avatar
  • 5,526
0 votes
1 answer
1k views

How to convert Proper Motion in RA & Dec to Galactic Coordinates

I'm trying to parse stellar data in the GAIA 2 release to galactic coordinates and am struggling with the velocity component. I've tried following online documentation and papers, but end up with ...
Borborbor's user avatar
0 votes
0 answers
59 views

Why can't ESA/NASA build a handful of Gaia telescopes and launch them into different positions in space for better accuracy?

I've noticed that many stars in GAIA DR2 have highly uncertain distances. Why can't a space agency send multiple Gaia spacecraft into orbit around different places (One in L2 Earth, one in ...
WarpPrime's user avatar
  • 6,613
3 votes
1 answer
466 views

Approximate spectral type and luminosity given apparent magnitude and distance

I am looking at the data acquired from the Gaia DR2 survey. I found that most of the stars had their distance and apparent magnitude catalogued, but not their spectral type and luminosity class. Is ...
WarpPrime's user avatar
  • 6,613
2 votes
1 answer
181 views

How precisely we know the Gaia spacecraft baseline? [Question related to Planet 9 and the cosmic distance ladder]

The European Space Agency mission Gaia is performing an outstanding job by measuring the parallaxes of almost 2 billion stars, many of which are thousands of light years away from the Sun. For this ...
Swike's user avatar
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6 votes
2 answers
4k views

How can I calculate the uncertainties in magnitude like the CDS does?

When you check an entry of the Gaia DR2 stellar catalogue in Vizier, for example this one, you can see that there is a value for the G magnitude (in our case 18.0733 mag) and a value for the ...
Swike's user avatar
  • 3,856
4 votes
1 answer
138 views

How do OGLE-III and GAIA measure the mass of free microlensing black holes?

What is the "hypothesized lower mass gap" between 2.5 and 5 solar masses? eventually links to Constraining the masses of microlensing black holes and the mass gap with Gaia DR2. The angle of ...
uhoh's user avatar
  • 31.4k
1 vote
1 answer
469 views

What does correcting for LSR mean in galactic velocities?

This is a two-part question, but both parts are related: I'm aware that modern astronomical software can correct velocities for the local standard of rest (LSR), but what does that really mean? As in,...
AstroNewbie's user avatar
5 votes
1 answer
240 views

What is the overlap between the Gaia and the Hipparcos catalog?

Is there any kind of concordance available between the sources in the Hipparcos catalog and the Gaia DR2 catalog? I.e., mapping the Gaia DR2 source_id to the Hipparcos HIP number?
Joe Knapp's user avatar
  • 153
4 votes
1 answer
804 views

Distance to Proxima Centauri (Gaia VS New Horizons parallax program)

The current best parallax measurement for the nearest star to the Solar System, Proxima Centauri, has been given by the European Space Agency's Gaia mission. This is $768.5004\; \pm \; 0.2030 \; mas$ (...
Swike's user avatar
  • 3,856
14 votes
2 answers
3k views

Why not send a Gaia-like mission to Mars?

This answer to the question why we didn't send Gaia to Neptune's orbit raises the question of why we don't send a Gaia-like mission to the orbit of Mars. It seems like it doesn't have the problems ...
usernumber's user avatar
  • 17.4k
46 votes
5 answers
9k views

Why is Gaia operating around Earth orbit? Why not send it to Neptune's orbit?

Gaia is an astrometry spacecraft that's currently operating around the Sun-Earth L2 Lagrangian point. Question: why here? Why not the Sun-Neptune L2 Lagrangian point? By orbiting the Sun at a larger ...
Allure's user avatar
  • 3,992
3 votes
0 answers
67 views

Why is it hard to reconcile Gaia DR2 with the HIP data set

I'm trying to get a database of about 20 million of the brightest stars in the sky for a project I'm working on, and I want to reconcile it with the Hipparcos data set. Currently, I'm only using the ...
Charles Lohr's user avatar
4 votes
1 answer
742 views

Fits file re-alignment

I would like to re-align an image using a reference image (taken from GAIA). I am aware of the software Koords developed by the Karma team: https://www.atnf.csiro.au/computing/software/karma/ ...
Carter Rhea's user avatar
5 votes
1 answer
1k views

Obtaining TESS input catalog (TIC) IDs for Gaia `source_ids`?

The TESS input catalog (TIC) "uses the GAIA DR2 catalog as a base" according to the catalog's website. The Gaia DR2 database provides source_ids for each ...
Shiania White's user avatar
1 vote
1 answer
383 views

How can GAIA's accuracy for position, parallax, and annual proper motion for a given star be the same number?

Per Wikipedia's Gaia (spacecraft); Objectives: Determine the position, parallax, and annual proper motion of 1 billion stars with an accuracy of about 20 microarcseconds (µas) at 15 mag, and 200 ...
uhoh's user avatar
  • 31.4k
2 votes
1 answer
59 views

What has GAIA found out about the dwarf galaxy heritage of stars in the Milky Way, if anything?

I ran across the image below in the August 2000 ESA Bulletin # 103 GAIA – Unravelling the Origin and Evolution of Our Galaxy Figure 3. This simulation shows how a galaxy halo, like our own, may ...
uhoh's user avatar
  • 31.4k
11 votes
3 answers
278 views

Is there an optimum orbit for a Hipparcos/Gaia-like parallax observatory

The Gaia spacecraft is currently mapping the stars in the Milky Way by parallax. It orbits in the Earth-Sun L2 Lagrange point. The parallax observed from the spacecraft orbiting around the sun allows ...
Ingolifs's user avatar
  • 4,137