Spectral Analysis of Light Pollution at UST

Light pollution, the effect of human-made light that escapes into unintended areas, is a common and increasing problem for astronomical observations of distant and dim objects. This study aims to characterize this effect at the University of St. Thomas, and urban university within the St. Paul, MN metropolitan area, through a spectroscopic analysis of the local light pollution to determine which wavelengths of light are impacting our campus Observatory. Data was obtained with an 8-inch Celestron telescope combined with a both a low-resolution Ocean Optics spectrometer and a higher-resolution Lhires III spectrometer, both covering the visible portion of the spectrum. Our analysis of the resulting data demonstrates that that there are no wavelength ranges that stand out significantly above the background noise. Therefore, spectroscopy appears to be a viable method for conducting astronomical observations at the St. Thomas Observatory..