Skynet 2: Expansion and Improvement of the Skynet Robotic Telescope Network (2024)

Undergraduates: Donovan Schlekat, Andreas Buzan, Reece Clark

Faculty Advisor: Daniel Reichart
Department: Physics and Astronomy

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The Skynet Robotic Telescope Network was originally built in 2004 with the goal of carrying out rapid, multi-wavelength observations of gamma-ray bursts within seconds of their detection. Originally only containing six telescopes, today Skynet has expanded in both scale and mission, growing to contain ~20 optical telescopes as well as one radio telescope, and evolving into both a scientific and educational platform for doing astronomy. Skynet currently serves professional astronomers as a data collection tool, as well as educators and their undergraduate students taking introductory astronomy courses around the country. We sought to completely overhaul Skynet’s website, or user interface, applied programming interface, and database design, to significantly expand the network with additional telescopes. The overhaul also allows previously incompatible instruments to be added to Skynet, such as optical polarimeters, and the integration of at least three additional radio telescopes into the network. So far, we have made significant progress on the overhaul of the database, API, and UI, upgrading Skynet to be more user-friendly, powerful, and capable. These new telescopes and software features will transform the scientific and educational capabilities of the network, allowing new astronomical research and supporting a newly developed undergraduate course “The Multi-Wavelength Universe!”