Jerix James says prior to this, they’ve made a documentary on black holes, warm holes and white holes
Giridhar Sundaram
Chennai: Two Chennai students have hit the bull’s-eye in their first attempt and made a preliminary discovery of an unknown asteroid as part of a search campaign. The work is conducted globally by the International Astronomical Search Collaboration (IASC) and in India by Space, a Delhi-based body, that works towards popularising science and astronomy and trains students and amateur astronomers for asteroid hunting. This is the first time a Chennai school took part in the campaign.
Giridhar Sundaram and Jerix James, both class XII students of St John’s International Residential School here have made the discovery and in all likelihood it is going to become a provisional discovery, which means the students can have a chance of naming the asteroid.
Initially, Space facilitated the students with necessary orientation, trained them in advanced data analysis and astrometrica software, which provides the ability to easily compare astrometrical images for moving object discovery and also gave them hands on practice to hunt for asteriods.
Later, students were provided with exclusive access to astronomy images to conduct actual research and analysis. It was an amazing experience working on the software, the students said.
Giridhar, who has a long-standing interest in astro-physics, says “The first stage is preliminary discovery and then it moves to pr visional discovery. Once that happens it goes to naming of the asteroids. We’ll name it after our school!”
Jerix James says prior to this, they’ve made a documentary on black holes, warm holes and white holes. One person they missed meeting was the missile man A.P.J. Abdul Kalam.
Prinicpal Elizabeth Edwin said both students had strong inclination towards astro-physics.
S. Venkata Narayanan, zonal business manager (South), Space, said the Asteroid Search Campaign is organised in three phases every year and this year Indian students have achieved nine preliminary asteroid discoveries and 111 Near Earth Objects (NEO).
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