Class probes secret lives of stars

They love from a distance.

They pulse and flare and fall into black holes.

And maybe they hold the key to a full-ride scholarship.

So says Russell Genet, who is teaching a free, online Eastern Arizona College Payson course in astronomy. He promises each student will end up with a published scientific research paper to their credit. Getting your name on a research paper in a scientific journal not only counts as a life experience – it has gotten generations of students scholarships to major universities.

The course will focus on the bizarre world of binary star systems, whose strange lives and spectacular deaths hold the secret to the fate of the universe.

The student teams will settle on a research question – then learn how to use a program to direct the telescope to gather data on a select list of stars. In some cases, they’ll determine whether a single point of light deep in the Milky Way is actually a binary star system. In other cases, they’ll focus on binary star systems already identified in previous surveys. Often, only repeated observations over a period of years can determine the crucial details of this dance of the stars.

Last semester, four EAC Payson students took the online class, along with four students from Colorado and four students from India. Genet has obtained research grants to cover the cost of tuition. The students will submit their results for publication – despite problems they encountered in scheduling time on a telescope in Chile. Fortunately, the Caris Foundation has donated $128,000, so EAC Payson can buy its own telescope for future classes. Now, he’s raising money to add an observatory for the telescope on campus.

Genet has completed two or three careers in an adventuresome life. Along the way, he has written hundreds of scientific papers and more than a dozen books. In the Air Force, he helped develop flight simulators for fighter pilots. In the Air Force, he also started his long obsession with astronomy — and robotic telescopes. He ultimately helped invent and robot telescopes — which could automate star studies and surveys. In his third career, he has developed astronomy programs for high schools and community colleges using those low-cost, automatic telescopes that make it possible for students to contribute to critical research on things like binary star systems. He is past president of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific – as well as an instrument-rated pilot.

The co-instructor for the course is Rachel Freed, co-founder and president of the Institute for Student Astronomical Research. As well as editor of the Journal of Double Star Observations.

Students will learn the basics of remote-controlled telescopes, which make it possible to program a telescope to spend the night gathering data on the stars – including the dance of two stars locked in a binary system. That includes about 85% of the stars in the universe – according to our current best guess. Some are in systems with three or more stars. So our single-star solar system is actually an oddity.

Students will then form teams to tackle a research question involving binary star systems. As it turns out, these paired stars orbiting one another provide the best way to determine the mass of distant stars – since the mass of the two stars affects how fast and close they orbit. And as it turns out – the total mass of the universe will determine its fate.

Of course, a myriad of other mysteries lurk in the fine print of how these binary systems work. What are the odds of life-bearing planets in the universe? How did stars form in the first place – and how will they die? How many black holes lurk out there – and how have they affected the evolution of galaxies? Are planets able to support life common – or vanishingly rare? Can you afford to attend college?

That last one’s especially interesting for students in rural communities, who traditionally have a much harder time getting into college – and paying the hefty, rising cost of attending a university. So far, 700 students in classes offered by the Astronomy Research Seminar that Genet launched have become co-authors of 200 published papers. Ganet’s EAC Payson course uses Zoom on Monday and Wednesday for 90 minutes each night and is open to students from other colleges as well.

Genet hopes to drum up interest in the course on Jan. 23 with a “Cosmic Dinner” at the Delicious Café in Payson, which will feature conversations about supernovae explosions and the love lives of stars – not to mention stellar cannibals. You can reserve a seat for the $30-a-plate dinner by emailing him at russmgenet@aol.com.

The class started this week – but you can join in any time before the end of the month.