Phase 1 (a.k.a. QUEST1, a.k.a. QUEST-Venezuela) saw Yale University, Indiana Univeristy, Universidad de los Andes, and Centro de Investigaciones de Astronomia using the 1.0-m Schmidt telescope at the Llano del Hato Observatory in Venezuela. A custom-built, 16-CCD camera was used in drift scan mode to image the high-Galactic-latitude, equatorial sky. The original motivation behind the QUEST project was the constraint of the Cosmological Constant from gravitationally lensed quasars. A number of complimentary science results have and continue to come out of phase 1 of the QUEST collaboration (discovery of TNO EB173, discovery of optical counterpart of GRB990308, low redshift quasar-quasar correlation function, survey of Orion OB1, RR Lyrae survey, variable quasar survey)
Phase 2 (a.k.a. QUEST2, a.k.a. Palomar-QUEST (PQ)) builds on the earlier work of Phase 1. Now using a larger (112 CCDs) custom-built camera on the 48-inch Oschin Schmidt telescope at the Palomar Observatory, PQ sees Yale University, Indiana University, Caltech, UIUC/NCSA, JPL and LBL collaborating in a survey rich with opportunities in time-domain astronomy. Type-1a supernovae, gamma-ray bursters, cataclysmic variable stars in open clusters, Kuiper Belt objects and near-Earth asteroids, and quasar variability are examples of research made possible by searching for objects that vary in luminosity or position on the sky over time.
Over the past two years, I have contributed to PQ while a postdoctoral researcher at UIUC and NCSA. We have contributed to the collaboration's efforts by establishing a permanent archive for all raw and processed data colelcted at Palomar. We have also been utilizing NCSA computing facilities to process the raw data and provide data results to the collaboration members within 24 hours of the raw data arriving at NCSA. The main science driver of the research group at UIUC is the study of quasar variability.
