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Finding Hazardous Asteroids Using Infrared and Visible Wavelength Telescopes (2019) / Chapter Skim
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3 Current and Near-Term NEO Observation Systems
Pages 20-27

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From page 20...
... Lincoln Laboratory LINEAR asteroid search program began in 1998. Between 1998 and 2013, the program used two 1-meter, ground-based, visible-wavelength telescopes located near Socorro, New Mexico, to detect asteroids.
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From page 21...
... , and the Air Force. The monthly automatic search program used three 1-meter aperture, ground-based, visible-wavelength telescopes (two located in Hawaii and one at Palomar Observatory in southern California)
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From page 22...
... Over time, NEO surveys have used larger telescopes that have more sensitive detectors and observe larger regions of the night sky. As a result, the rate of NEO discoveries over the past 20 years has risen steadily, to the point where more than 2,000 NEOs were discovered in 2017 alone -- two orders of magnitude more annual discoveries than in 1995.
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From page 23...
... Brown Act. LSST's contributions to NEO survey goals have been modeled, yielding the following results: • If the contributions of NEO search efforts from their inception in the early 1990s to the present are included, the LSST will result in an NEO catalogue for objects with an absolute brightness, or H value, of less than 22, which is 75 percent complete by the end of its 10-year baseline survey.
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From page 24...
... Chodas, J.B. Evans, et al., 2017, Report of the Near-Earth Object Science Definition Team: Update to Determine the Feasibility of Enhancing the Search and Characterization of NEOs, NASA Science Mission Directorate, https://cneos.jpl.nasa.gov/doc/2017_neo_sdt_final_e-version.
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From page 25...
... Vereš, 2019, "LSST's Projected NEO Discovery Performance," presentation to the committee, February; A Mainzer, 2016, "NEOCAM: Near Earth Object Camera: A Comprehensive Survey of the Solar System," presentation at the 14th Meeting of the NASA Small Bodies Assessment Group, January 27-29, https://www.lpi.usra.edu/sbag/meetings/jan2016/presentations/Mainzer.pdf (A prior pre-publication version of this report incorrectly attributed the source material as P
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From page 26...
... . Their relatively high infrared fluxes favor detection with an infrared telescope, which is also the preferred method to provide accurate diameters.
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From page 27...
... This is because, in general, survey telescopes do not have the required instrumentation and, even if they did, characterization observations would reduce the time spent surveying, and thus reduce the discovery rate. The same is true of follow-up astrometric observations; survey time and space-based instruments should not be spent on obtaining necessary astrometric data for objects that can be observed from the ground and accomplish the same goals.
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Key Terms

  • brown act
  • neo observation
  • earth object
  • act goals
  • survey telescope

  • neo surveys
  • lincoln laboratory
  • neo survey
  • neo search
  • synoptic survey

  • wavelength telescopes
  • asteroid tracking
  • hazardous asteroids
  • geometric albedo
  • diameter estimates

  • infrared survey
  • projected neo
  • neo discovery
  • survey mission
  • object search

  • earth objects
  • object studies
  • infrared telescope
  • search program
  • telescopes located

  • technology lincoln
  • cited elsewhere
  • material cited
  • lowell observatory
  • night sky


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