Associate Professor Miroslav Filipovic

• Biography
• Areas of Research / Teaching Expertise
• Publications
• Contact Details

Biography

Astronomy, Computing and Information Technology are my profession, hobby, interest and passion. Especially, research in Astronomy has been a source of fascination for me now since the early 1980s. Imaging at all frequencies, especially at radio and X-rays, are my main ‘tools’. All the work is closely related to understanding the evolution of, and interactions between galaxies and the processes of star-formation and star evolution as they affect galaxy evolution. Also, I have been involved in projects which develop astronomical software. I have contributed (papers/talks) in several prominent meetings. Also, I am increasingly interested in a development of so called Virtual Observatory which is a part of collaboration between a number of Universities in USA and MPE (Germany).

My Postdoctoral positions have been with the Max-Planck-Institute (MPI) and the Australia Telescope National Facility (ATNF). I held a French and German Government Scientific Fellowship. My principal scientific interest while at the MPI was Supernova Remnants (SNRs) and the Magellanic Clouds. In the past five years my major scientific research interests are in SNR, PNe, HII regions, AGNs, Local Group of galaxies, Masers, X-ray background radiation (Pavo deep field), virtual observatory, comets, star/planet formation and Stellar Content (WR, O, B stars) in nearby galaxies. Presently, one of my main areas of interest is Astrobiology and the Astronomical Uniqueness expressed throughout study of various extremophiles. Collaboratively, I won significant amount of observing time at all major astronomical observatories including ATCA, Parkes, AAO, HST, Gemini, XMM-Newton, Chandra, VLA, SAAO and VLT. My background is therefore broad and encompasses many areas of technology, science and computers research and education.

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Areas of Research / Teaching Expertise

Astrophysics, Astronomy, Physics, Computing

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Publications

Book
Filipović Miroslav
Title: Astronomija na svim talasima (Astronomy at all wavelengths)
Year of publishing: October 2007
Publisher: Spremo ISBN: 978-86-86565-01-3
No. of pages: 197


Amongst my 50+ major journal publications since 1995 the following 10 are particularly significant because they have led to a number of new discoveries. My 50-refereed publications (in the past 15 years) have resulted in total of 560+ citations (http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abstract_service.html). This is an average of 10+ references per paper with a Hirsch=12.

Filipović M.D., Payne J.L., Hughes A., Dickel J.R., Bojicic I.S., Parker Q.A. Crawford E., Stootman F.
‘Radio Planetary Nebulae in the Magellanic Clouds’
2009, MNRAS, in press

Outline: Probably my most important discovery to date is that we have found a NEW group of celestial objects which was nick-named Mini (Sub) Supernova Remnants (SNRs). During our mosaic radio-continuum search for point-like objects in the Magellanic Clouds, we found (unexpectedly) some 30+ objects which showed very unusual characteristics and were immediately associated with optically known Planetary Nebulae (PNe). After  numerous follow up observations at various frequencies we concluded that these objects represent Sub group of PNe with extremely large initial masses - previously only theoretically predicted.

Filipović M., Ognjanovic S., Ognjanovic M.,
‘Evidence of molecular adaptation to extreme environments and applicability to space environments’
2008, Ser. Astro. J., 176, 81

Outline: This most recent discovery represents an important contribution in the area of Astrobiology. Namely, we have found gene signatures responsible for adapting microscopic life to the extreme Earth environments. We found clusters of orthologous groups (COGs) common to several hyperthermophiles and exclusion of those common to a mesophile (non-hyperthermophile). We use software which we specifically developed for extremophile genome comparative analyses in order to search for additional novel genes involved in hyperthermophile adaptation. The following hyperthermophile genomes incorporated in this software were used for these studies: Methanocaldococcus jannaschii (M. jannaschii), M. kandleri, Archaeoglobus fulgidus (A. fulgidus) and three species of Pyrococcus. Common genes were annotated and grouped according to their roles in cellular processes where such information was available and proteins not previously implicated in the heat-adaptation of hyperthermophiles were identified.

Aharonian F., et al., Filipović M. D., et al.,
‘H.E.S.S. observations of the supernova remnant RXJ0852.0-4622: shell-type morphology and spectrum of a widely extended VHE gamma-ray source’
2007, ApJ, 661, 236

Outline: This paper represent exciting discovery in the area of High Energy Astrophysics. Using a state of the art Gamma-ray, Radio and X-ray telescopes we have found a CLOSEST Supernova Explosion to Earth. At the distance of about 500 parsecs we estimated that explosion occurred some 675-1500 years ago. Surprisingly, this enormous nearby star explosion was not seen earlier and even more strangely no historical records are available.

Bruens C., Kerp J., Staveley-Smith L., Mebold U., Putman M.E., Haynes R.F., Karberla P.M.W., Muller E., Filipović M.D.,
‘The Parkes HI survey of the Magellanic System’
2005, Astron. and Astrophys., 432, 45

Outline: In this paper We presented the first fully and uniformly sampled, spatially complete HI survey of the entire Magellanic System with high velocity resolution (Δv = 1.0 km s−1), performed with the Parkes Telescope. Approximately 24% of the southern sky was covered by this way. A fully automated data-reduction scheme was developed for this survey to handle the large number of HI spectra (1.5x106). The Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) and the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) are associated with huge gaseous features – the Magellanic Bridge, the Interface Region, the Magellanic Stream, and the Leading Arm. Approximately two thirds of this HI gas is located close to the Magellanic Clouds (Magellanic Bridge and Interface Region), and 25% of the HI gas is associated with the Magellanic Stream. The Leading Arm has a four times lower HI mass than the Magellanic Stream, corresponding to 6% of the total HI mass of the gaseous features. We have analyzed the velocity field of the Magellanic Clouds and their neighborhood introducing a LMC-standard-of-rest frame. The HI in the Magellanic Bridge shows low velocities relative to the Magellanic Clouds suggesting an almost parallel motion, while the gas in the Interface Region has significantly higher relative velocities indicating that this gas is leaving the Magellanic Bridge building up a new section of the Magellanic Stream. The Leading Arm is connected to the Magellanic Bridge close to an extended arm of the LMC. The clouds in the Magellanic Stream and the Leading Arm show significant differences, both in the column density distribution and in the shapes of the line profiles. The HI gas in the Magellanic Stream is more smoothly distributed than the gas in the Leading Arm. These morphological differences can be explained if the Leading Arm is at considerably lower z-heights and embedded in a higher pressure ambient medium.

Meech K.J., et al., Filipović M.D., et al.
‘Deep Impact: Observations from a Worldwide Earth-Based Campaign’
2005, Science, 310, 265

Outline: This was one of the historic projects in human kind and I had a great honour to be one of many active participants. On 4 July 2005, many observatories around the world and in space observed the collision of Deep Impact Spacecraft with comet 9P/Tempel 1 or its aftermath. This was an unprecedented coordinated observational campaign. Our data show that:
(i) there was new material after impact that was compositionally different from that seen before impact;
(ii) the ratio of dust mass to gas mass in the ejecta was much larger than before impact; (iii) the new activity did not last more than a few days, and by 9 July the comet’s behavior was indistinguishable from its pre-impact behavior; and
(iv) there were interesting transient phenomena that may be correlated with cratering physics.

Jones P.A., Burton M.G., Sarkissian1 J.M., Voronkov M.A., Filipović M. D.,
‘Australia Telescope radio observations of comet 9P/Tempel 1 during the Deep Impact encounter’
2006, MNRAS, 369, 1995

Stupar M., Parker Q. A., Filipović M. D
‘Newly confirmed and high quality candidate Galactic SNRs uncovered from the AAO/UKST
Ha survey’
2008, MNRAS, 390, 1037

Filipović M.D., Haberl F., Winkler F.P., Pietsch W., Payne J.L., Crawford E., De Horta A.Y., Stootman F., Reaser B.E.,
‘New XMM-Newton Supernova Remnants in the SMC’
2008, Astron. and Astrophys, 485, 63

M. Stupar, M.D. Filipović, P.A. Jones and Q.A. Parker
‘Radio continuum observations of the galactic supernova remnant Vela Z (G266.2-1.2)’
2005, Advances in Space Research, Volume 35, Issue 6, 1047

Payne J.L., Filipović M.D., Panutti T., Jones P.A, Duric N., White G.L., Carpano S.,
‘Multi-frequency Study of Extragalactic SNRs and HII Regions, Part I. Sculptor Group

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