Founder: Monitor My Planet
Current Research
I measure the rotation periods, shapes, and spin states of near-Earth and potentially hazardous asteroids from open photometry, and I build automated light-curve algorithms to scale that work to the Vera C. Rubin Observatory (LSST).
What I am working on now:
- Rubin / LSST asteroid algorithms - automated methods to recover rotation periods, shapes, and unusual variability (tumbling, candidate binaries) from the sparse, multi-band photometry the Vera C. Rubin Observatory will deliver for millions of moving objects.
- Binary asteroid (1727) Mette - a rotation and mutual-event study of this Hungaria binary; paper in preparation for the Minor Planet Bulletin.
- Hayabusa2 and asteroid Torifune - predicted the asteroid spin phase at JAXA's 5 July 2026 flyby from open survey data, to be tested against the spacecraft images.
PLANETARY DEFENSE · JAXA Hayabusa2 Mission
Rotational Phase of Asteroid (98943) Torifune During Hayabusa2’s 2026 Flyby
Arushi Nath · 4 July 2026
On July 5, 2026, Japan's Hayabusa2 spacecraft races past the near-Earth asteroid Torifune at 5 km/s, skimming within about a kilometre of a 450-meter rock we've barely seen. Torifune spins once every five hours, so the spacecraft only glimpses whichever face happens to be turned toward it. Using open public sky-survey data, orbital geometry, and algorithms, I predicted - before the flyby - which side the spacecraft would see, and showed why it should catch the asteroid at the shorter side. Soon Hayabusa2's own images will tell us whether I got it right.
RESEARCH OBSERVATORY · Engineering for Millimagnitude Precision
Building My Remote Observatory at 15: Engineering for Millimagnitude Photometry Precision
Arushi Nath · 28 May 2026
How I built my research-grade remote observatory in southern Spain dark-night skies at fifteen to study near-Earth asteroids and multiplanetary systems: the engineering decisions behind millimagnitude photometry, the fundraising and Masason Foundation grant, debugging a loose screw 7,000 km away, and what the International Astronomical Union (IAU) Minor Planet Center code R60 now lets me contribute to planetary defence.
On April 24, 2026, I gave a 12-minute oral presentation, "Photometric Characterisation of Potentially Hazardous Asteroid 2025 FA22: Rotation Period, Shape, and Taxonomy," at the 32nd Young Scientists' Conference on Astronomy and Space Physics hosted online by Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv (April 20–25, 2026). The conference brings together bachelor's, master's, and Ph.D. students alongside early-career researchers from across the world. In my talk I shared how I observed the newly discovered potentially hazardous asteroid 2025 FA22 during its close approach to Earth on 2025 September 18 UTC, when it passed within roughly two lunar distances. Key results I presented included: a well-defined synodic rotation period of 13.075 ± 0.002 hours, derived from R-band photometry; a peak-to-peak lightcurve amplitude of 0.62 mag, with a double-peaked structure pointing to an elongated body; and multi-filter BVRI photometry yielding moderately red colours consistent with an S-complex taxonomic classification. These findings have since been peer-reviewed and published in the Minor Planet Bulletin, 53(2), 2026, and the Journal of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada, 120(2), April 2026.
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My latest research has been published in the Journal of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada. Potentially Hazardous Asteroid (PHA) 2025 FA22 made a close approach to Earth on 2025 September 18 (UTC) at a distance of approximately two lunar distances. I obtained time-resolved CCD photometry of the asteroid during its close Earth approach in September 2025. A well-defined rotation period of 13.075 ± 0.002 h was derived from R-band photometry, with a peak-to-peak lightcurve amplitude of 0.62 mag, implying a significantly elongated shape. Multi-filter BVRI photometry yields moderately red colours consistent with an S-complex taxonomic classification. These observations demonstrate that citizen scientists can provide meaningful physical characterisation of near-Earth asteroids.
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I am a co-author, having contributed 30 transit photometry observations of several exoplanets to the ExoClock network. Several of my observations focused on targets flagged with significant ephemeris drift, or potential transit timing variations (TTVs), including TESS-discovered planets with short observational baselines and rapidly growing uncertainties.
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- Gold Medal
- The Actuarial Foundation of Canada Award
- Excellence in Astronomy Award from the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada
- Top of the Category Award in Curiosity and Ingenuity
- Youth Can Innovate Award
For more information on my project visit: https://www.monitormyplanet.com/posts/1393
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CONFERENCE POSTER · DART Asteroid Research Poster
Lunar and Planetary Science Conference (LPSC) 2023 Poster Presentation
Arushi Nath · March 2023
(My Research Poster in 20 threaded tweets)
Strengthening Planetary Defence: Developing Algorithms to Determine the Physical Properties of Asteroids using Robotic Telescopes and Applying them to Measure the Impact of NASA's DART Asteroid Deflection Mission
The pace of discovery of near-earth asteroids outpaces current abilities to analyse them. Knowledge of an asteroid's physical properties is essential to deflect them. I developed open-source algorithms that combine images from robotic telescopes and open data to determine asteroids' size, rotation, and strength. I took observations of the Didymos binary asteroid, and my algorithm determined it to be 850m wide, with a 2.26-hour rotation period and rubble pile strength. I measured a 35-minute decrease in the mutual orbital period after impact by the 2022 NASA DART Mission. External sources validated the findings. Every citizen scientist is now a planetary defender.
CITIZEN-SCIENCE PROJECT · Asteroid Detection Algorithms
Strengthening Planetary Defence: Detecting Unknown Asteroids using Open Data, Math, and Python
Arushi Nath · March 2023
I took images from 4 telescopes located at different latitudes to get full sky coverage. I wrote Python algorithms to query European Space Agency's Gaia and NASA/JPL's Horizons ephemeris system to find all known stars and asteroids. Mean, standard deviation, and histograms created masks to remove known objects. The remaining objects were classified as possible asteroid candidates.
I detected 3 'preliminary' asteroids. Using the telescope's focal length and celestial location, my algorithm's plate-solving ability determined its Right Ascension and Declination. I reported this information by creating a Minor Planet Center report for my images. I have made my code and methodology open-source to crowdsource planetary defence.
SOLE-AUTHOR PEER-REVIEWED PUBLICATION · Foundations of Planetary Defence
Finding Unknown Asteroids to Strengthen Planetary Defence
Arushi Nath · February 2023
The success of the NASA Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) Mission in slamming a kinetic impactor on moonlet Dimorphos of asteroid Didymos on 2022 September 26 and changing its orbit has put the planetary defence on world news. The challenge of planetary defence intrigues me. Roughly 66 million years ago, an asteroid at least 10 kilometres wide may have led to the extinction of dinosaurs. If humans do not want to suffer the same fate, then we need to be well-informed and prepared to handle any threats of an asteroid colliding with Earth.
https://hotpoprobot.com/2022/11/24/webinar-asteroid-science-with-remote-telescope/