National Astronomy Meeting Poster Exhibition

National Astronomy Meeting Poster Exhibition
National Astronomy Meeting Poster Exhibition

Welcome to the National Astronomy Meeting Poster Exhibition!

Below you will find all 156 posters from this year’s NAM, hosted by the University of Bath. If you are a NAM participant, there will be a poster session using Gather.Town on Thursday 22nd July, all details of which are provided in the conference platform Hopin. Poster IDs (In the format ABXX or ABCXX) next to names will help identify the ‘zone’ in which you will find the presenter in Gather.Town.

Posters are searchable by name and session tags. All posters are public and will be accessible after NAM. 

There will be prizes for best student and postdoctoral posters, as well as the MIST Rishbeth prize. Thanks to Oxford University Press, Winton and the RAS for funding the prizes.

The full science programme for NAM is available here.


If you are a poster author and there are any issues with your poster, please contact RAS Diversity Officer, Aine O’Brien at aobrien@ras.ac.uk

Trails caused by the fifth deployment of satellites making up the Starlink constellation.
GatherTown ID: MLA08
  • AstroML
  • MIST
  • Student
We examine the effectiveness of identifying distinct evolutionary histories in IllustrisTNG-100 galaxies using unsupervised machine learning with Gaussian Mixture Models. We focus on how clustering NMF-compressed metallicity histories and star formation histories produces subpopulations of galaxies with distinct evolutionary properties. This is in contrast to clustering photometric colours, which fail to resolve such histories. We identify a population of galaxies inhabiting the upper-red sequence, that has a significantly higher ex-situ merger mass fraction, and a star formation history that has yet to fully quench, in contrast to an overlapping, satellite-dominated population along the red sequence, which is distinctly quiescent. These populations also have distinct halo evolutionary histories, demonstrating the potential of applying unsupervised learning to observable properties of galaxies to distinguish between these histories.
GatherTown ID: BD06
  • Beyond 1D
  • Student
My PhD project focuses on studying gas kinematics in the centres of a sample of 23 nearby galaxies from the Composite Bulges Survey (Erwin et al. 2021) with integral-field unit observations, particularly using MUSE data. The contribution of gas inflows to the evolution of galaxies is significant, but the dominant driving mechanism for gas inflows in galactic centres and connection of gas flow to nuclear stellar components are not yet fully understood. Theoretical arguments and numerical models indicate that gas inflow occurs in coherent structures (shocks, kinematic spirals) that form in response to the stellar gravitational potential. Gas emission-line studies reveal disturbed kinematics diverging from simple circular motions, and we study unbinned kinematic maps which, together with a large FoV of MUSE, maximises the prospect of finding coherent structures. The goal of my project is to determine whether such structures provide the dominant mechanism of inflow.

To highlight the coherent structures, we fit a rotating disc to the kinematics and subtract its circular velocity. We find that the residual maps strongly depend on the parameters of the fitted disc. There are coherent structures in the residuals, but they are distorted or obscured by artefacts introduced by the fit. Here we show that comparing residuals from discs, which are fitted with different parameters, allows us to separate the true coherent residuals from the artefacts of the fit.

GatherTown ID: SPO08
  • Solar-Open
The Interchange Reconnection phenomenon has been proposed as a mechanism for the generation of the Slow Solar Wind, and the origin of its characteristic qualities. We have used the Adaptively Refined Magnetohydrodynamic Solver (ARMS) code to simulate flows at the photosphere resembling supergranules to twist magnetic field lines and drive magnetic reconnection. We find that field lines recently opened by Interchange Reconnection are confined to "finger"-like regions which are stretched by magnetic expansion. Such a spatial distribution would be detectable in a typical Parker Solar Probe orbit as periodic modulations to plasma and field parameters. We find that the rate and properties of Interchange Reconnection differ between field lines at the edge of a pseudostreamer and helmet streamer, leading to a difference in coronal hole boundaries.
GatherTown ID: SBD03
  • Stat Methods in Big Data
We propose here a methodology in which by using large samples of homogeneous optical spectra one can obtain a spectral type specific spectral index, which in combination with unrivalled kinematic information from Gaia allows one to identify ultracool subdwarf candidates. We also discuss the reasoning for this method, intended for use alongside existing photometry and astrometry in the Gaia era.
GatherTown ID: MOP02
  • MagnetosphereOuterPlanets
Jupiter produces stunning dynamic UV and X-ray auroral displays from both its poles. Previous work comparing these two wavebands was based on a single simultaneous Chandra X-ray Observatory (CXO) observation and Hubble Space Telescope (HST) orbit from 24 February 2003. Despite the limited dataset, that revolutionary work revealed that: 1. Jupiter’s hard X-ray emission (photon energy > 2 keV), which is produced by precipitating electrons, coincided with the UV main auroral emission (Branduardi-Raymont et al. 2008) 2. that Jupiter’s soft X-ray emission (photon energy 2 keV), which is produced by precipitating ions, coincides with UV aurora flares that occur polewards of the main emission (Elsner et al. 2005).

To further explore the interconnections between the two high energy wavebands, we leverage the 22 simultaneous HST and CXO Jupiter aurora observations taken between 2016 and 2019. Here, we present overlaid X-ray and UV auroral videos from both of Jupiter’s poles, revealing the shared auroral morphologies. By working with school students, through the ORBYTS research-with-schools programme, we further investigate how different time cadences showcase shared auroral structures. For two decades the Jovian X-ray community has used the term ‘X-ray hot spot’ to define the soft X-ray auroral emissions spot (Gladstone et al. 2002; Dunn et al. 2017; Weigt et al. 2020). Here, we show that this is not a single coherent structure but may actually be connected to several seemingly distinct UV auroral morphologies. Nichols et al. (2019) and Grodent et al. (2018) both independently identify 6 types of UV auroral morphology for Jupiter. We explore further global connections by contrasting the X-ray morphology with each of these. We close by attempting to combine the knowledge of each auroral waveband to interpret possible driving processes from the shared auroral morphologies.
GatherTown ID: ASR06
  • Astroreach
  • Student
One of the easiest ways to capture the interest of the general public is with a “pretty” picture of the awe inspiring structures we see in the universe. Be this an image from the Hubble space telescope or the first reconstruction of a black hole, these images can be a way to start a conversation, educate and ignite a new passion. With the ever-increasing resolution and size of cosmological simulations and the increases in computing power of modern HPCs, we have unique opportunities to not only produce eye-catching imagery but also utilise “real-time” animations to cultivate understanding of the large scale processes in the universe that happen on distinctly non-human scales. In this talk we will delve into this intersection between art and astronomy and how it can be built upon to inspire the next generation of astronomers; specifically with the formation of a cross-discipline group, “Art X Astronomy”, to bring together specialists to produce valuable outreach products at this intersection.
GatherTown ID: FMM08
  • Mars Missions - 2021+
  • Postdoc
The ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO)’s Colour and Stereo Surface Imaging System (CaSSIS) provides multi-spectral optical imagery at 4-5m/pixel spatial resolution. CaSSIS has higher spatial resolution, image quality, and with colour bands, compared to the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) Context Camera (CTX) images at 6m/pixel. However, the spatial resolution of CaSSIS is limited compared to the details revealed by the MRO High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) images typically at 25-50cm/pixel resolution. Nevertheless, CaSSIS has much better global coverage compared to HiRISE (4% since 2006) and can provide more repeat and stereo observations in the future.

Improving the spatial resolution of CaSSIS images would allow greater amounts of scientific information to be extracted about the nature of the Martian surface and how it formed or changes over time.

In this work, we introduce a novel Multi-scale Adaptive weighted Residual Super-resolution Generative Adversarial Network (MARSGAN; Tao et al., 2021) for single-image super-resolution restoration of TGO CaSSIS images and demonstrate how this provides an effective resolution enhancement factor of about 3 times. We demonstrate with qualitative and quantitative assessments of CaSSIS SRR results over the Mars2020 Perseverance rover’s landing site. We also show examples of similar SRR performance over different science test sites mainly selected for being covered by HiRISE at higher resolution for comparison, which include many features unique to the Martian surface.

Application of MARSGAN will allow high resolution colour imagery from CaSSIS to be obtained over extensive areas of Mars beyond what has been possible to obtain to date from HiRISE.

This research is supported by the UKSA Aurora programme (2018-2021) under grant ST/S001891/1.
GatherTown ID: MIS04
  • Open Session MIST Science
  • MIST
  • Student
It is well documented that space weather may impact electricity infrastructure, and several widespread blackouts have been observed in the past few decades and directly linked to the largest geomagnetic storms (e.g. the Hydro Quebec incident in 1989). However, less is known about the impact of lower-level GICs on the health of transformers in the long term. In this study, the long term impact of geomagnetic activity on 13 power station transformers in the UK was investigated. Dissolved gas measurements from 2010-2015 were used to look for evidence of a link between degradation of the transformer insulation and heightened levels of SYM-H and dB/dt as measured at Eskdalemuir magnetometer station. Firstly, case studies were examined of the most significant storms in this time period using dissolved gas analysis (DGA) methods, specifically the Low Energy Degradation Triangle (LEDT). The case studies were then augmented with a statistical survey, including Superposed Epoch Analysis (SEA) of multiple storm events. No evidence of a strong space weather impact can be found during this time period, likely owing to the relatively quiet nature of the Sun during this epoch and the modernity of the transformers studied.