A moon or natural satellite is a celestial body that orbits a planetary body such as a planet, dwarf planet, or an asteroid. Scientists seek understanding the origin and evolution of our solar system by studying moons of these bodies. Additionally, s
earches for satellites of planetary bodies can be important to protect the safety of a spacecraft as it approaches or orbits a planetary body. If a satellite of a celestial body is found, the mass of that body can also be calculated once its orbit is determined. Ensuring the Dawn spacecrafts safety on its mission to the asteroid (4) Vesta primarily motivated the work of Dawns Satellite Working Group (SWG) in summer of 2011. Dawn mission scientists and engineers utilized various computational tools and techniques for Vestas satellite search. The objectives of this paper are to 1) introduce the natural satellite search problem, 2) present the computational challenges, approaches, and tools used when addressing this problem, and 3) describe applications of various image processing and computational algorithms for performing satellite searches to the electronic imaging and computer science community. Furthermore, we hope that this communication would enable Dawn mission scientists to improve their satellite search algorithms and tools and be better prepared for performing the same investigation in 2015, when the spacecraft is scheduled to approach and orbit the dwarf planet (1) Ceres.
A promising method for the detection of UHE neutrinos is the Lunar Cherenkov technique, which utilises Earth-based radio telescopes to detect the coherent Cherenkov radiation emitted when a UHE neutrino interacts in the outer layers of the Moon. The
LUNASKA project aims to overcome the technological limitations of past experiments to utilise the next generation of radio telescopes in the search for these elusive particles. To take advantage of broad-bandwidth data from potentially thousands of antennas requires advances in signal processing technology. Here we describe recent developments in this field and their application in the search for UHE neutrinos, from a preliminary experiment using the first stage of an upgrade to the Australia Telescope Compact Array, to possibilities for fully utilising the completed Square Kilometre Array. We also explore a new real time technique for characterising ionospheric pulse dispersion which specifically measures ionospheric electron content that is line of sight to the moon.
