Collecting project ideas for Gaia DR3

UW Brainstorming Doc

  • EBHRD
    • Finding the “best eclipsing binaries”
    • if the TESS-based metric is ready (& it is!), apply it to the 2MILLION Gaia EBs and find the “best” targets!
    • this is what i’m planning to work on first! :D
  • SETI-related projects:
    • Dyson sphere stuff (e.g. mis-matches between luminosities and spectral type/class)
    • Outliers in super-color space (machine learning fun times)
    • Surveying the WOW! Fields for variability (play off this paper some) (fun student project!)
    • SETI Ellipsoid, can we compute the SN1987A Ellipsoid crossing time & uncertainties for the entire 1.8B stars? (via AXS+Astropy?)
    • Gaia light curve from Boyajian’s Star
  • Gaia for spectroscopic flux calibration?
  • Gaia light curve for QX Cas (and other special/weird systems)
    • which star is eclipsing?! (good first project)
  • Stellar rotation:
    • match Gaia rotation to Kepler… how precise & accurate?
    • Gaia + TESS, Gaia + Kepler…
    • can we see the rotation period gap with Gaia?
    • rotation in clusters? (low-hanging fruit if any!)
  • Binary star density across galaxy
    • looking @ spatial density of equal-mass binaries
    • Played with idea in 2018
    • Could be done entirely (initially) on AXS/Epyc
  • (Re)make textbook figures with new data!
    • literally any textbook has figures that can/should be replicated w/ Gaia!
  • Gaia Wilson Bappu (w/ SLH!)
    • already gathering existing HK data (repo)
    • replicate Wallerstein+2019, in honor of George
    • can we do WBE with the Ca IRT alone?
  • Activity Cycles from Ca IRT?
    • competition from Gaia DR3 team probably
    • compare Gaia data to e.g. Mt Wilson HK archive? (can we see activity cycles from Gaia photometry alone?)
  • “Everything in its right place”
    • stars in CMD in Hiparcos vs Gaia, or Gaia over time…
    • played with this idea in 2018
    • Look for specific star motions across interesting regions of the CMD (Post-AGB stars, He Flash, etc)
  • Searching for new PNe in Gaia… spectra could be useful?