MASTER

MASTER (Mobile Astronomical System of Telescope-Robots^[1]) is a International network of Russian fully robotic telescopes in five Russian sites, and in South Africa, Argentina,Mexica and the Canary Islands.

It is intended to react quickly to reports of transient astronomical events. It started its development in 2002 and it is in fully autonomous operations since 2011.^{[citation needed]}

On 17 August 2017, an autonomous MASTER telescope in Argentina successfully recorded a collision of neutron stars some 130 million light-years away.^[2]

Types of observed objects

Master is designed to search for optical transients and successfully discovers them. These include:

GRB
Supernovae
Kilonova
Novae
Asteroids, including potentially dangerous ones
Сataclysmic variables
Optical orphan flares
Comets

Main discoveries

Independent discovery of kilonova on August 17, 2017
Detection of optical polarization of gamma-ray bursts' prompt radiation^[3]
Observation of the brightest gamma-ray burst in history^[4]*

Notes

^ Lipunov, Vladimir; Kornilov, Victor; Gorbovskoy, Evgeny; Shatskij, Nikolaj; Kuvshinov, Dmitry; Tyurina, Nataly; Belinski, Alexander; Krylov, Alexander; Balanutsa, Pavel; Chazov, Vadim; Kuznetsov, Artem; Kortunov, Petr; Sankovich, Anatoly; Tlatov, Andrey; Parkhomenko, A.; Krushinsky, Vadim; Zalozhnyh, Ivan; Popov, A.; Kopytova, Taisia; Ivanov, Kirill; Yazev, Sergey; Yurkov, Vladimir (January 2010). "Master Robotic Net". Advances in Astronomy. 2010 (1). arXiv:0907.0827. Bibcode:2010AdAst2010E..30L. doi:10.1155/2010/349171.
^ Lipunov, V. M.; Gorbovskoy, E.; Kornilov, V. G.; Tyurina, N .; Balanutsa, P.; Kuznetsov, A.; Vlasenko, D.; Kuvshinov, D.; Gorbunov, I.; Buckley, D. A. H.; Krylov, A. V.; Podesta, R.; Lopez, C.; Podesta, F.; Levato, H.; Saffe, C.; Mallamachi, C.; Potter, S.; Budnev, N. M.; Gress, O.; Ishmuhametova, Yu.; Vladimirov, V.; Zimnukhov, D.; Yurkov, V.; Sergienko, Yu.; Gabovich, A.; Rebolo, R.; Serra-Ricart, M.; Israelyan, G.; Chazov, V.; Wang, Xiaofeng; Tlatov, A.; Panchenko, M. I. (20 November 2017). "MASTER Optical Detection of the First LIGO/Virgo Neutron Star Binary Merger GW170817". The Astrophysical Journal Letters. 850 (1): L1. arXiv:1710.05461. Bibcode:2017ApJ...850L...1L. doi:10.3847/2041-8213/aa92c0.
^ Troja, E.; Lipunov, V. M.; Mundell, C. G.; Butler, N. R.; Watson, A. M.; Kobayashi, S.; Cenko, S. B.; Marshall, F. E.; Ricci, R.; Fruchter, A.; Wieringa, M. H.; Gorbovskoy, E. S.; Kornilov, V.; Kutyrev, A.; Lee, W. H.; Toy, V.; Tyurina, N. V.; Budnev, N. M.; Buckley, D. A. H.; González, J.; Gress, O.; Horesh, A.; Panasyuk, M. I.; Prochaska, J. X.; Ramirez-Ruiz, E.; Lopez, R. Rebolo; Richer, M. G.; Román-Zúñiga, C.; Serra-Ricart, M.; Yurkov, V.; Gehrels, N. (July 2017). "Significant and variable linear polarization during the prompt optical flash of GRB 160625B". Nature. 547 (7664): 425–427. Bibcode:2017Natur.547..425T. doi:10.1038/nature23289. PMID 28748924.
^ O’Connor, Brendan; Troja, Eleonora; Ryan, Geoffrey; Beniamini, Paz; van Eerten, Hendrik; Granot, Jonathan; Dichiara, Simone; Ricci, Roberto; Lipunov, Vladimir; Gillanders, James H.; Gill, Ramandeep; Moss, Michael; Anand, Shreya; Andreoni, Igor; Becerra, Rosa L.; Buckley, David A. H.; Butler, Nathaniel R.; Cenko, Stephen B.; Chasovnikov, Aristarkh; Durbak, Joseph; Francile, Carlos; Hammerstein, Erica; van der Horst, Alexander J.; Kasliwal, Mansi M.; Kouveliotou, Chryssa; Kutyrev, Alexander S.; Lee, William H.; Srinivasaragavan, Gokul P.; Topolev, Vladislav; Watson, Alan M.; Yang, Yuhan; Zhirkov, Kirill (9 June 2023). "A structured jet explains the extreme GRB 221009A". Science Advances. 9 (23): eadi1405. arXiv:2302.07906. Bibcode:2023SciA....9I1405O. doi:10.1126/sciadv.adi1405. PMC 10246904. PMID 37285439.