Data Mining and Machine-Learning in Time-Domain Discovery & Classification

Understand

The changing heavens have played a central role in the scientific effort of astronomers for centuries.

• Galileo's synoptic observations of the moons of Jupiter and the phases of Venus starting in 1610, provided strong refutation of Ptolemaic cosmology.
• In more modern times, the discovery of a relationship between period and luminosity in some pulsational variable stars led to the inference of the size of the Milky Way, the distance scale to the nearest galaxies, and the expansion of the Universe.
• Distant explosions of supernovae were used to uncover the existence of dark energy and provide a precise numerical account of dark matter.