Related papers: Program objectives and specifications for the Ultr…
Very little work has been done searching for astrophysical transient optical emission in the millisecond to nanosecond regime with significant sensitivity. We call this regime "Ultra-Fast Astronomy", or UFA. To investigate transients on as…
Ultra Fast Astronomy is a new frontier becoming enabled by improved detector technology allowing discovery of optical transients on millisecond to nanosecond time scales. These may reveal counterparts of energetic processes such as fast…
The Ultra-Fast Flash Observatory pathfinder (UFFO-p) is a new space mission dedicated to detect Gamma-Ray Bursts (GRBs) and rapidly follow their afterglows in order to provide early optical/ultraviolet measurements. A GRB location is…
The Ultra-Fast Flash Observatory (UFFO) Pathfinder is a payload on the Russian Lomonosov satellite, scheduled to be launched in November 2011. The Observatory is designed to detect early UV/Optical photons from Gamma-Ray Bursts (GRBs).…
The Swift Gamma-ray Burst (GRB) observatory responds to GRB triggers with optical observations in ~ 100 s, but cannot respond faster than ~ 60 s. While some ground-based telescopes respond quickly, the number of sub-60 s detections remains…
The transient optical sky has remained largely unexplored on very short timescales. While there have been some experiments searching for optical transients from minutes to years, none have had the capability to distinguish millisecond Fast…
We characterized the S13360-3050CS Multi-Pixel Photon Counter (MPPC), a silicon photomultiplier (SiPM) manufactured by Hamamatsu Photonics K.K.. Measurements were obtained inside a light tight dark box using 365 nm, 400 nm, 525 nm, 660 nm,…
Here we describe the first light of the novel 9-channel wide-field optical monitoring system with sub-second temporal resolution, Mini-MegaTORTORA, which is being tested now at Special Astrophysical Observatory on Russian Caucasus. The…
The gravitational wave GW170817 from a binary neutron star merger and the simultaneous electromagnetic detection of the GRB170817A by Fermi Gamma-Ray Space Telescope, opened a new era in the multi-messenger astronomy. Furthermore, the GRBs…
The Ultra-Fast Flash Observatory (UFFO) is a new space-based experiment to observe Gamma-Ray Bursts (GRBs). GRBs are the most luminous electromagnetic events in the universe and occur randomly in any direction. Therefore the UFFO consists…
In our Ultra-Fast Astronomy (UFA) program, we aim to improve measurements of variability of astronomical targets on millisecond and shorter time scales. In this work, we present initial on-sky measurements of the performance of silicon…
The discovery of Fast Radio Bursts (FRBs) at cosmological distances has opened a powerful window on otherwise unseen matter in the Universe. In the 2020s, observations of $>10^{4}$ FRBs will assess the baryon contents and physical…
Though the ultraviolet (UV) domain plays a vital role in the studies of astronomical transient events, the UV time-domain sky remains largely unexplored. We have designed a wide-field UV imager that can be flown on a range of available…
Fast Radio Bursts (FRBs) are extremely energetic pulses of millisecond duration and unknown origin. In order to understand the phenomenon that emits these pulses, targeted and untargeted searches have been performed for multi-wavelength…
The development of detectors with a high time resolution has been pivotal to our comprehension of neutron stars and the accurate measurement of their properties. While high-time resolution astronomy has become a standard in the radio and…
The forthcoming launch of the Ultraviolet Transient Astronomy Satellite (ULTRASAT) will transform our understanding of the transient ultraviolet sky by increasing our ability to identify transients due to its unprecedented 204 deg2 field of…
Fast Radio Bursts (FRBs) are short-duration radio transients that occur at random times in host galaxies distributed all over the sky. Large field of view instruments can play a critical role in the blind search for rare FRBs. We present a…
The Ultraviolet Transient Astronomy Satellite (ULTRASAT) is scheduled to be launched to geostationary orbit in 2026. It will carry a telescope with an unprecedentedly large field of view (204 deg$^2$) and NUV (230-290nm) sensitivity (22.5…
We propose measuring the arrival time difference of Fast Radio Bursts (FRBs) along two adjacent sightlines as a new probe to dark matter substructures on scales down to $\sim 1\,$AU. We discuss two observational scenarios in which it may be…
Observations at far-infrared and submillimeter wavelengths promise to revolutionize the study of high redshift galaxies and AGN by providing a unique probe of the conditions within heavily extinguished regions of star formation and nuclear…