| Abstract: | We are in a golden age of PN discovery thanks to high sensitivity, wide-field, narrow-band surveys of the Galactic plane. These new "H-alpha" surveys have yielded Planetary Nebulae (PNe) discoveries that have doubled totals accrued by all telescopes over the previous 250 years. These PNe are not simply more of the same. Most are more obscured, evolved and of lower surface brightness than previous compilations while others are faint but compact and more distant. An extensive 20 year programme of spectroscopic confirmation on a variety of 2m and 4m telescopes has been pursued to confirm these discoveries. Large-scale PNe studies, particularly those of a statistical nature or undertaken to understand true PNe diversity and evolution must now reflect this fresh PN population landscape from our combined sample of ~3760 Galactic PNe now available. Following this motivation we have provided the community, with an accessible, on-line "one-stop" SQL database for essential, up-to date information for all known Galactic PN called HASH. We have: i) Reliably removed the many PN mimics/false ID's that have biased previous compilations and subsequent studies; ii) Provided accurate, updated positions, sizes, morphologies, radial velocities, fluxes, multi-wavelength imagery and spectroscopy; iii) Given links to CDS/Vizier for the archival history for each object; iv) Provided an SQL interface to sift, select, browse, collate, investigate, download and visualise the complete currently known Galactic PNe diaspora. As a result the community can access the most complete and reliable data with which to undertake new science. In this talk I will cover the progress, research projects and power of the HASH research platform as pursued at HKU. |
