Moving to paradise

One week has passed since I moved to Puerto Rico. I moved in to pursue a career of a planetary radar scientist at the Arecibo Observatory, or officially, the National Astronomy and Ionosphere Center, which hosts the world's largest single-dish radio telescope (that includes a radar transmitter). It may not be obvious how one becomes a planetary radar scientist, and even the word "planetary radar" might be unfamiliar for many so let me give a brief overview of my background first. I'll write most of the blog in English so that more people can read it but I'll also explain some of the technical terms in Finnish so that my mom understands too. ;)

I chose to become an astronomer (or at least a scientist) already in early teenage. I studied astronomy in the University of Helsinki since 2006 with geophysics as a minor subject and wrote both Master's and PhD thesis about radar scattering of planetary surfaces. I defended my thesis on January 8, 2016.

In common language, "scattering" refers to alterations experienced by electromagnetic radiation, such as light, when interacting with single particles or a surface. Radar scattering means that the wavelength of the radiation is microwaves, that is, somewhere between 1 cm and 1 meter (while for example the wavelength of optical light is some hundreds of nanometers), and that I'm concentrating on the backscattering direction.

[In Finnish: Sironta tarkoittaa tässä tapauksessa sähkömagneettisen säteilyn, kuten valon ominaisuuksien muuttumista sen osuessa johonkin pintaan tai hiukkaseen. Tutkasironta viittaa tiettyyn aallonpituusalueeseen senttimetreistä metreihin, eli mikroaaltoihin, kun tavallisen valon aallonpituus on joitakin satoja nanometrejä eli noin 100 000 kertaa lyhyempiä. Lisäksi tutkasironnassa keskitytään vain takaisinpäin palaavaan eli takaisinsironneeseen säteilyyn.]

Planetary radar doesn't look for asteroids or comets, but it's very effective with finding out more about the ones that have been already found. For example, when a new asteroid is discovered, the distance to it may be off with thousands of kilometers. Observing it with a planetary radar can enhance the distance information to some tens of meters. So if the discoverers are unsure if an asteroid will hit the Earth or not, they can ask the planetary radar people to check on it. We can also derive information about the asteroids' (or comets') rotation, size, shape, and surface characteristics from the radar data.

In my PhD thesis I modeled numerically how different kinds of particles or planetary surfaces scatter the radar signal. So because I had done that sort of research for years, it made a lot of sense to apply the job here. The solar system research group in the University of Helsinki is specialized in studying electromagnetic scattering, but I felt that the group couldn't offer me enough the kind of research I want to do, so work-wise it was a dream-come-true to get an opportunity to work here.

I have visited here earlier, for 2 months from Oct to Dec 2013 and for 2 weeks in Nov 2014, so by this year, it was a familiar place with familiar people already. There are changes in staff often as post-docs come and go and, at times, as Puerto Rico gets the best of some people (it might be a paradise for some but definitely not everyone!). In total, there's about a hundred people working here, most of whom are facility staff, engineers and electronics staff who take care that everything works as it should. Since fall, there's been no official site director. Currently, the telescope is on a longer maintenance break as it's being re-painted.

There are three research groups (ionosphere, radio astronomy, and planetary). Our group has (for now) only three doctoral scientists: me, Ed, and our group leader Patrick, and three supporting people: Linda, Luisa, and, as a newbie, Beth. The average age of the people in our group is probably well below 35 and everyone is super nice. Ed's giving out bear names and mascot pokémons (I'm Pola(r) bear and thinking about Cubchoo as my mascot). One person in the group had left just before I arrived and Linda is unfortunately moving out soon but new people is being hired almost all the time.

The first week has been mainly reserved for re-orientation, filling out a some-centimeters-thick pile of forms for USRA and so on. I live the first month on site, in a very cute wooden bungalow on a near-by hill:

Next month I should move somewhere else; there's been talk that I could move to Linda's place. It's a big house with a yard but I could easily afford the rent with the local rates. I'll probably get dogs as soon as I move there but hopefully not all the eight that live there now...

Yesterday I went to see the Puerto Rican night-life with the guys from the observatory. The warm wind, coquí frogs singing, rum drinks, salsa and bachata music and dancing with great people created an authentic Caribbean atmosphere that I call the paradise. Let the adventure begin!

Caribbean sunset seen from my porch

The coquí report #1: I haven't seen any coquí frogs yet but I'll keep looking!