“Artificial satellite observations in planetary defense data”
Bill Gray;
Contributed talks
Planetary defense surveys routinely find artificial objects in their data. Some move slowly enough to mimic natural objects. It is desirable to keep track of them, so that they won't be erroneously reported as minor planets, and so that follow-time isn't wasted on them. The methods and problems involved in tracking them will be discussed.
“Astrometry and Photometry with CATCH: Online Analysis Tools for SBN Archives”
Ben Sharkey;
Contributed talks
The CATCH service at PDS-SBN allows users to find targets of interest within archived survey datasets. This service computes target locations and searches specified data sets for the frames where the target may have appeared. CATCH provides an API interface and a graphical display of cutouts to provide quick evaluation of data. We will discuss initial steps to implement online tools to aid in target identification and initial analysis. These tools include astrometric corrections and photometric calibration of subframes relative to standard catalogs to precisely find targets regardless of the original data's pointing accuracy. Image stacking will enable searches for fainter objects not detectable in individual frames. Photometric tools are also under development, accommodating flexible aperture and background annulus parameters to allow studies of both asteroids and comets.The CATCH Analysis Tools will include streamlined steps for generating target locations and brightnesses in formats suitable to report to the MPC.
“ATLAS: Extending the Reach, Making Connections, and Peril in Precovery”
Larry Denneau;
Contributed talks
The era of Vera C. Rubin and NEO Surveyor and V=24 near-Earth object discoveries is nearly upon us. Observatories and archives are scrambling to find ways to squeeze even more performance out of their systems to meet the challenges of Rubin and Surveyor. Yet there is still a great deal of action brighter than V=24, as Rubin may not detect many small near-Earth asteroids when they are very close to the Earth. This regime is where the ATLAS survey lives.
Now with five observatories surveying 24/7 distributed globally, ATLAS has accelerated efforts to improve multi-observatory survey efficiencies and object detection, in some cases via real-time collaborations with other projects. In this talk, we present three such efforts with in ATLAS: a) real-time telescope scheduler optimized for NEO discovery; b) cross-telescope and cross-organizational detection linking of discovery tracklets, and c) participation in public archives for object recovery. We close with some guidance regarding the difficult problem of object precovery and the importance of deep knowledge regarding survey data in this process.
“Machine learning improvement of the Near Earth Object discovery process”
Peter Veres;
Contributed talks
Over the last twenty years, the discovery of Near-Earth Objects (NEOs) has relied heavily on dedicated survey programs and the subsequent vetting of candidates via the Minor Planet Center’s Near-Earth Object Confirmation Page (NEOCP). This platform plays a central role in the rapid identification of NEOs by publishing short-arc tracklets for immediate follow-up by the astronomical community. Thanks to the rapid follow-up, over 38,000 NEOs have been cataloged to date, with discovery rates exceeding 3,000 per year since 2020.
Candidate selection for NEOCP posting is primarily based on the NEO digest2 score — a probability metric estimating whether a given object is an NEO. Tracklets with a digest2 score above 65 are qualified for posting, as NEOs typically score close to 100, while other populations, such as main-belt asteroids, tend to score much lower. Nevertheless, roughly 6,000 candidates appear on the NEOCP annually, of which approximately 11% remain unconfirmed due to insufficient follow-up. Among those confirmed, only about two-thirds are ultimately classified as NEOs, with the rest largely consisting of main-belt objects.
In this study, we perform a systematic evaluation of 13 digest2-derived orbital classification categories, analyzing them in both their "raw" and "noid" configurations. Our objective is to improve the efficiency of the NEOCP by reducing the prevalence of non-NEOs among posted candidates. We show that by incorporating the full set of digest2-derived parameters—rather than relying solely on the NEO digest2 score—it is possible to filter out up to 20% of non-NEO submissions without significantly impacting true NEO recoverability.
Additionally, we explore the predictive capabilities of several machine learning (ML) classifiers—Gradient Boosting Machines (GBM), Random Forests (RF), Stochastic Gradient Descent (SGD), and Neural Networks (NN)—applied to NEOCP candidate data collected between 2019 and 2024. Using observations from 2019–2023 for training and 2024 for validation, we achieve consistent NEO classification accuracies of 91%–92%, with negligible variation across models.
We advocate for integrating digest2-based feature sets with ML methodologies to improve candidate selection on the NEOCP. This approach promises not only to reduce the burden of false positives on follow-up networks but also to enhance the overall efficiency and completeness of NEO detection efforts.
“Meerkat Asteroid Guard: 5 Years of Success and the Big v2.0 Update”
Charlie Drury;
Contributed talks
New asteroids and comets are continuously being discovered in the night sky. Such objects need to be dynamically characterised quickly, to determine the possibility of Earth impact and schedule follow-up observations before the object is lost. Here we present the Meerkat Asteroid Guard, an automated imminent impact warning service developed and operated at the ESA NEO Coordination Centre.
Meerkat continually downloads tracklets for newly discovered objects from the Minor Planet Center. For many of these new objects, the observation arc length is short. While the object's plane of sky position and motion may be well known, the remaining two parameters required to describe the orbit, the topocentric range and range rate, are not. Such short arcs lead to severe errors and degeneracies in traditional orbit determination methods. To overcome this, we employ the method of systematic ranging, whereby a grid of topocentric range and range rates have their orbits fitted with associated weighted root mean square error. From this error we derive a posterior probability distribution. By scanning a suitably dense grid, we can produce a statistical description of the most likely orbital solutions, and derive important information such as estimated size and impact probability. Meerkat operates 24/7, delivering email and phone alerts to subscribed users for imminent impactors and close approaches.
Over its five-year operational lifetime, Meerkat has successfully issued alerts for the past seven imminent impactors, from 2022 EB5 to most recently 2024 XA1. These alerts were vital for coordinating follow-up observations and preparing local authorities for fireball events.
After undergoing major software development and testing, v2.0 is ready to be released. Much of the functionality has been redesigned with ESA's new flight dynamics library, GODOT. This library is comprehensive and versatile, enabling the optimisation of the orbit determination, impact monitoring and ephemeris routines. New features such as the grid memory and propagation error handling have reduced the error rate of the systematic ranging algorithm. Under the hood, the software exploits a fully dockerised architecture for more efficient service and deployment. The software input is upgraded to meet modern standards, able to process ADES 2022 files and retrieve observations from the Minor Planet Center SBN Postgres database. In the output, new metrics flag potential false positive alerts to assist astronomers in time-critical follow-up observations.
The importance of an imminent impactor warning system cannot be overstated. With the advent of new surveys from ESA Flyeye, the Vera Rubin Observatory and NEO Surveyor, the number of new detections is predicted to increase dramatically. To this end, it is vital we ensure our planetary defence systems are as accurate and reliable as possible, ready to inform decision-makers when hazardous objects are found.
“MPC Processing in the LSST Era”
Matthew John Payne;
Contributed talks
I provide an update on the many changes to the MPC's processing pipeline that have been implemented in preparation for the influx of data expected from the Rubin LSST survey.
I will describe the changes that have been made to our hardware, software and overall system architecture with the goal of improving the efficiency and resilience of the processing system.
Finally I will go on to describe the ongoing and future work that we will be performing to further improve the processing of all data submitted to the MPC.
“NEO follow-up of Rubin candidates: What, Why, How, and Should You”
Mario Juric;
Contributed talks
The Vera C. Rubin Observatory is a new NSF/DOE-funded facility on Cerro Pachón, Chile. It houses the 8.4m Simonyi Survey Telescope and the 3.2 Gigapixel LSSTCam camera. The Observatory is in the final stages of commissioning, expected to enter operations by the end of 2025. Once operational, Rubin will execute the Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST). Enabled by its 9.6 square degree field of view and a cadence covering the sky every 3-4 days to ~24.5 mag, the LSST dataset can dramatically advance the understanding of the Solar System and planetary defense.
This talk will present the first public Solar System-related results from Rubin's early commissioning efforts, their implications to Planetary Defense, and discuss the plans to submit Rubin single-night high-confidence tracklets for inclusion on the NEOCP. Because publication could initially increase NEOCP traffic to >100 new objects per night, at very low purity (<10%; Wagg et al. 2025), it will be important to organize community follow-up around the highest confidence and follow-up value candidates. I will present some options, and hope to initiate a discussion on what the community would like to see for successful follow-up of Rubin NEOCP submissions.
“NEO Surveyor Update”
Tyler Linder;
Contributed talks
Space missions provide an opportunity to rapidly increase knowledge in a field by acquiring data that responds to a specific mission goal. Understanding the intersection of space-based and ground-based observation is critical to maximizing the scientific return of any mission. For example, the impact of the Gaia spacecraft extends to every corner of astronomy. This mission had a simple goal: produce a high-precision astrometric and photometric catalog of the sky, and its measurements have fed into many follow up observational studies. For asteroids, the ten-fold astrometric precision improvement enabled by Gaia’s data has profoundly affected the quality of asteroid orbits, in addition to yielding advantages in all other astronomy fields.
The NEO Surveyor 0.5m telescope at Sun-Earth L1 will observe simultaneously in two bands, NC1 (4-5.2µm) and NC2 (6-10µm). These two infrared observations will provide an astrometric position that is improved by the simultaneous two-band measurement of the asteroid and stars, and the object's diameter through modeling of the thermal flux. The mission design will take advantage of the fact that the near-Earth object population has an average albedo of much less than 50%, which means most of the Sun’s energy is absorbed, making these asteroids thermally bright.
NEO Surveyor is designed to discover and measure diameters of the near-Earth asteroid and comet population. It will not collect other physical characterization observations such as spectral type or geometric albedo, and is not optimized to obtain rotation rates for all objects detected. Therefore, this provides an opportunity for ground-based telescopes to expand the mission's scientific return by carrying out ground-based population studies.
We will present three possible ground-based studies that can be undertaken. First, since NEO Surveyor will detect asteroids via their thermal emission, the actual albedo of the asteroid will remain unknown without optical observations. As described in Masiero et al. (2024), the best estimate NEO Surveyor will be able to provide of a possible V-band magnitude is plus or minus two magnitudes. Therefore, the first opportunity for ground-based observers is to carry out a large ground-based campaign to collect optical observations of NEO Surveyor’s discoveries. Without an optical tracklet, additional characterization observations will be unlikely to succeed due to the large magnitude uncertainty.
The second possible ground-based observation campaign will be a geometric albedo study. Combining geometric albedos with NEO Surveyor diameters would uncover the real NEO albedo distribution. The third useful campaign will be a spectral type versus diameter study to determine the spectral type distribution of the NEO population as a function of size.
“Night Sky Brightness”
Al Grauer;
Contributed talks
The ability to efficiently detect faint fast moving asteroids requires a knowledge of the brightness of the night sky. We are using Sky Quality Meters (SQMs) located on Mt. Lemmon, Mt. Bigelow, Kitt Peak, the Cosmic Campground IDSS, and other locations to measure night sky brightness. We have developed techniques to detect clouds and thus select the best astronomically dark nights. These data are used to measure sky brightness changes due to increasing solar activity, periodic changes as the Earth orbits the Sun, as well as dynamic events caused by coronal mass ejections or other changes in the solar wind. An interesting new result is that there appears to be a sky brightness minimum a few weeks after the vernal equinox and a maximum a few weeks after the autumnal equinox.
“Operational Monitoring at the Minor Planet Center”
N Casale;
Contributed talks
The Minor Planet Center (MPC) is the single worldwide location for receipt and distribution of positional measurements of minor planets, comets and outer irregular natural satellites of the major planets. Crucially, this includes Near Earth Objects (NEOs) and Potentially Hazardous Asteroids (PHAs). Thusly, real-time insight into the MPC’s operations is necessary. We present “dashboarding” tools that provide assurances of the MPC’s processing functionality, data on its performance, and statistics on its archive.
“Optimizing Near-Earth Asteroid Observation Strategies for the SEJONG Telescope at CTIO”
Hee-Jae Lee;
Contributed talks
The Save Earth Joint Observations for the Next Generation (SEJONG) telescope represents South Korea’s first dedicated facility for asteroid surveillance and is scheduled for installation at Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory (CTIO) in Chile by early 2027. Equipped with a 1.55-meter aperture and a wide 2.24° × 2.24° field of view, SEJONG is designed to proactively detect near-Earth asteroids (NEAs) and potentially hazardous asteroids (PHAs), thereby strengthening global planetary defense capabilities.
To ensure effective operation, we aim to develop optimized observation strategies tailored to early threat detection. Using Granvik’s near-Earth asteroid population model, we analyze the sky-plane distribution and orbital characteristics of yet-undiscovered NEAs. This analysis helps identify favorable regions and times for detection.
Based on these results, we propose survey strategies for SEJONG that maximize its capability to discover hazardous objects. This work lays a foundation for SEJONG’s operations and contributes to international efforts to mitigate asteroid impact risks.
“Rapid-response characterization of near-Earth asteroid 2024 YR4”
Maxime Devogele;
Contributed talks
On 27 December 2024 the newly-discovered near-Earth asteroid 2024 YR4 was identified as a virtual impactor whose impact probability later pushed it to Torino Scale 3—the first object ever to trigger an International Asteroid Warning Network notification. We performed a multi-facility observing campaign combining time-series photometry (LDT, VLT, CSS), broadband visible–NIR colours (LDT, TNG, VLT/HAWK-I) and low-resolution spectroscopy (GTC/OSIRIS).
A Fourier-series analysis of four independent light-curves yields a synodic rotation period of 19.4633 ± 0.0002 min. The composite reflectance spectrum is best matched by Sq/K-type taxonomy. Phase-curve photometry in the R band gives H_R = 23.8 and an unusually shallow slope (G = 0.50). Combining the recent results from the JWST (D=60 +- 7m) and our determination of the H magnitude, we found that YR4 should display a moderately low albedo that would be more consistent with a K-type classification rather than an S-type.
These results, obtained within weeks of discovery, illustrate the effectiveness of coordinated rapid-response strategies for planetary defence. The precise spin state, taxonomic class and photometric properties derived here would have been critical inputs for impact-probability refinement and mitigation-option studies had the threatening trajectory persisted. 2024 YR4 therefore serves as a touchstone case for future fast-paced characterization of hazardous asteroids.
“Recent Advances and Challenges in the Pan-STARRS Moving Object Processing System”
John Fairlamb;
Contributed talks
Pan-STARRS (PS) continues to be one of the most productive near-Earth object (NEO) survey programs to date. While some researchers have suggested that NEO discoveries are beginning to plateau or decline year-on-year, the community continues to set new records. Most notably, both PS and ATLAS surpassed their personal best for discoveries in 2024. For PS, this sustained productivity is largely due to improvements in our follow-up strategies and ongoing improvements to our Moving Object Processing System (MOPS) that leverage new technologies.
In this talk, I will provide a brief overview of recent changes to PS's NEO follow-up approach, including updates on the status of our observatories. I will then delve into recent upgrades to MOPS, with a focus on our transition to adopting micro-services and containerization to enhance scalability and control. I will conclude with a discussion of what our plans are for the upcoming LSST era.
“Recent upgrades of MPEC Watch”
Quanzhi Ye;
Contributed talks
MPEC Watch (https://sbnmpc.astro.umd.edu/mpecwatch/) is a utility that digests the Minor Planet Center’s publications to present statistical summaries of the reported observations of small bodies that are of high interest to the community. MPECs, or “Minor Planet Electronic Circulars” (https://minorplanetcenter.net/mpec/RecentMPECs.html), are issued in the form of emails and corresponding website postings, with their own DOIs by the Minor Planet Center for announcing discoveries of objects of interest (like Near-Earth Objects - NEOs, irregular satellites, or comets) and updates to the MPC’s database. MPEC Watch provides a summary of the discovery, follow-up, and first-follow-up statistics by worldwide observatories and surveys, which can be used to demonstrate the effectiveness of NEO observing programs to the community. We will discuss recent and planned upgrades of MPEC Watch, including searchable summary tables, data export options, survey statistics, and object-specific breakdowns.
This work is supported by the NASA Planetary Data System’s Small Bodies Node (NASA 80NSSC22M0024).
“Search and observations of asteroids in citizen science projects”
Maria Wicher;
Contributed talks
Citizen science is a form of participation and collaboration that actively involves non-scientists in scientific research. It is used in a wide range of areas, including ecology, medicine and astronomy. In recent years, citizen science has emerged as a powerful tool in astronomical research, enabling people from all over the world, regardless of their age, nationality or gender, to contribute to real scientific discoveries. In the field of asteroid search and observation, citizen scientists can currently help professional astronomers in three projects: International Astronomical Search Collaboration (IASC), The Daily Minor Planet (TDMP), and Come on! Impacting ASteroids (COIAS). This is particularly evident in the context of Planetary Defense, where detection and tracking of Near-Earth Objects (NEOs) are critical for assessing potential impact threats. The talk is an attempt to analyze these projects and presents a first-hand experience from an active participant involved in each of them. This work shows my observations, research and discoveries of minor planets as a citizen scientist. The presentation will cover different types of asteroids, including Main-Belt Asteroids, Near-Earth Objects, Jupiter Trojans and Trans-Neptunian objects, illustrating how citizen science contributes to our broader understanding of the Solar System dynamics.
“SPACEWATCH®: Following up Near-Earth Objects (NEOs) to help Determine their Orbits”
Cassandra Lejoly;
Contributed talks
SPACEWATCH®, which pioneered using CCDs to survey the sky for NEOs, currently conducts Near Earth Object (NEO) follow-up observations. To improve planetary defense capabilities by reducing the uncertainty in NEO orbital elements, we conduct full-time rapid astrometric follow-up observations of high priority NEOs as the sole users of the Lunar and Planetary Laboratory’s Spacewatch 1.8-m observatory and the Steward Observatory’s 0.9-m telescope on Kitt Peak. Additionally, we conduct astrometric follow-up with Steward Observatory’s Bok 2.3-m telescope during bright time with the Spacewatch Cassegrain Camera (SCC).
Our highest priority targets for NEO astrometric follow-up are virtual impactors (VIs) and Potentially Hazardous Asteroids (PHAs). PHAs are ≳140 meters in diameter with Earth Minimum Orbit Intersection Distances (EMOIDs) ≲ 0.05 au. VIs have sufficiently uncertain heliocentric orbital parameters such that at least one orbit solution predicts an Earth impact within 100 years. PHAs pose a greater hazard due to their size, but the majority do not have orbits in which the asteroid could impact Earth itself. VIs pose a greater impact risk due to their real (but low) probability of impact. Currently, only ~1% of NEAs on the JPL Sentry risk list of VIs are “large” (>140 m). It is particularly important to minimize the orbit uncertainties for VI PHAs to rule out (or in) possible impacts.
Spacewatch has observed a majority of the newly discovered NEOs that are or were on JPL’s VI impact risk list since October 16, 2019. According to the PDS SBN, from Sept. 1993 through March 2025, the 1.8-m is third in making the first observation for follow-up MPECs, sixth in follow-up MPECS, and fifth over all types of MPECs. It is fifth in MPECs for making the first follow-up observation over the past year. The 0.9-m is sixth in discovery MPECs and eighth in precovery MPECs from September 1993 through March 2025.
“The Vatican Advanced Technology Telescope, its current status and future plans”
Paul Gabor;
Contributed talks
The Alice P. Lennon Telescope and the Thomas J. Bannan Astrophysics Facility, informally the Vatican Advanced Technology Telescope (VATT), dedicated in 1993, is located on Mount Graham in Arizona. It is an aplanatic Gregorian telescope with an f/1 primary and an f/9 full system optics. In 2024, the mount control system was overhauled and a complete facility control system was implemented by ProjectSoft HK (Czech Republic). The new system, named ‘Don’, in honor of Donald M. Alstadt (1921-2007), uses PLCs. Together with new absolute encoders and drives, the telescope provides 3 arcsec rms pointing, and unguided tracking >1 hr. ‘Don’ will allow for remote and/or scripted operation, with no need for on-site operators. We are currently working on automated collimation and focusing. Procurement of a new imaging camera is also in process.
“Today's CATCH: Improvements for the Comet and Asteroid Telescopic Catalog Hunter”
Michael Kelley;
Contributed talks
CATCH is a search tool designed to identify observations of comets and asteroids in wide-field time-domain sky survey data. A driving use case for CATCH is to find observations or significant non-detections of potentially hazardous asteroids in archival data sets. Hosted and maintained by the Planetary Data System's Small Bodies Node, it currently contains 38 million observational data products from twelve different observatories, including surveys such as Spacewatch, Catalina Sky Survey, and ATLAS (Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert Survey). Together there are 12,000 observatory-nights spanning the years 1996 to 2025. We briefly review the methodology of CATCH and its features, then present our recent updates and future plans. For example, in 2025 we updated CATCH to support fixed-target searches, provide a 3D view of the Solar System at the time of the observation, and added the ability to limit searches by date range. Development on CATCH continues, and we will share our progress re-writing the CATCH backend, aimed at reducing typical full-database moving target search times from minutes to tens of seconds, and adding orbital-element-based searches.
“Twilight Discovery of near-Sun Asteroids and Naked-eye Comets at Palomar Observatory”
Bryce Bolin;
Contributed talks
While the majority of solar system objects discovered by wide field surveys are ordinary, they also provide the opportunity to discover hidden gems such as interstellar objects, near-Sun asteroids, and bright comets. These provide opportunities to characterize extrasolar planetesimals, search for new sources of asteroids in the inner solar system, and study the composition of the protoplanetary disk. I will describe survey techniques used to discover these hidden gems in observations of the near-Sun sky during twilight in current and next-generation surveys, such as the Zwicky Transient Facility and the Rubin Observatory. I will describe three examples of twilight solar system results: 1.) the discovery and follow-up observations of (594913) 'Ayló'chaxnim, the first known asteroid possessing an aphelion entirely within the orbit of Venus, 2.) the recovery of interstellar comet 2I/Borisov, and 3.) the discovery of naked-eye comet C/2022 E3 (ZTF). I will discuss the behind-the-scenes work of using machine learning in these results and their implications for the formation of the solar system and the composition of extrasolar and solar system planetesimals.
“Update of NEOZTF”
Quanzhi Ye;
Contributed talks
The Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF) is a wide-field optical time-domain survey that has been in operation since 2018. Routine near-Earth object (NEO) searches have been conducted on the dataset, resulting in the discovery of about 300 NEOs. We will present an update of the NEOZTF program featuring three recent upgrades: a revised Twilight Survey which operates to 10 degrees twilight, the AutoStreak pipeline for linking multiple trailed objects, and a routine search for (p)recovery detections of newly discovered NEOs.