Transients in New Surveys: the Undiscovered Country

Aim and description

Ongoing optical transient surveys have fundamentally altered the way we carry out transient science. The Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST), new satellites such as the ESA-Euclid, the NASA Wide Field Infrared Survey Telescope (WFIRST), as well as eROSITA, together with the Square Kilometer Array (SKA) and the BlackGEM project will provide a unique opportunity to determine the physical processes that govern even the rarest transient phenomena. However, these facilities come with their own unique challenges: millions of transients will be discovered and identifying the 'weirdos' in real-time will require innovative algorithms and techniques.

This workshop is inspired by recent developments in the astrophysics of transient objects that provide new science goals ready for when the next generation of surveys get underway. The vast zoo of transients at the cores of galaxies ('nuclear transients'), the still unexplained rising population of gap transients (faint, fast or blue), as well as superluminous supernovae are all classes of objects with unexplained physical origin where only a few examples have been discovered. The transient population beyond the standard paradigm is a rapidly evolving field. Exploring and defining it is one of the largest and most exciting challenges facing astronomers in 2018 and beyond.