MRI Consortium: Acquisition of Remote Observing Instrumentation for the Southeastern Association for Research in Astronomy Jacobus Kapteyn 1.0m Telescope

MRI 联盟：为东南天文学研究协会采购远程观测仪器 Jacobus Kapteyn 1.0m 望远镜

• 批准号: 1337566
• 负责人: Matthew Wood
• 金额: $ 47.4万
• 依托单位: Texas A&M University-Commerce
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2013
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2013-08-15 至 2016-07-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1337566&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: MRI; Consortium; Acquisition; Remote; Observing

The wide fields-of-view and scheduling flexibility of 1.0-m class telescopes make them excellent tools for monitoring periodically-variable and transient objects, carrying out large area surveys, and pre- or post-observations for large aperture or space-based telescopes. Operating costs are significantly reduced for robotic networks compared with on-site observing stations, and networks that cover a wide longitudinal baseline are essential for avoiding diurnal and seasonal cycle count ambiguities in variable sources. Dr. Matt Wood, Texas A&M University-Commerce, intends to augment the facilities operated by the Southeastern Association for Research in Astronomy (SARA) telescope consortium, which already include the 0.9-m reflector at Kitt Peak National Observatory and the 0.6-m telescope at Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory, with the recently-acquired 1.0-m Jacobus Kapteyn Telescope (JKT) at Roque de los Muchachos Observatory on La Palma, Canary Islands, to form a 3-telescope robotic telescope network covering more than 90 degrees of longitude. The new telescope will be outfitted with an improved secondary mirror, upgraded telescope drives and encoders, a CCD photometric camera, and the same dome control/weather monitoring software that is used on the other SARA telescopes. The science to be enabled is well-suited to the emerging field of time-domain astronomy: asteroids, cataclysmic variables and other types of binary stars, active galactic nuclei, and gamma-ray burst events, and includes topics that are already research foci for consortium astronomers.The remote operation of the JKT is expected to allow SARA to add a minimum of 4 new members to the 11-member consortium, and will extend the philosophy of ensuring that member faculty and students have access to versatile, capable observational facilities. These institutions, with relatively small departments of astronomy and physics, are typically under-represented in the national research arena, but are important instructional forums for scientific research because they allow undergraduate and graduate students to carry out their thesis and capstone projects using consortium facilities. Being able to remotely observe at a facility 6 hours ahead of the eastern seaboard will also improve SARA's ability to perform public outreach events in the U.S. Funding for development and construction of the prototype spectrograph is being provided by NSF's Division of Astronomical Sciences through its participation in the Major Research Instrumentation program.

1.0 m级望远镜的宽视场和调度灵活性使其成为监测周期性变化和瞬时物体、进行大面积测量以及大口径或空基望远镜的预观测或后观测的绝佳工具。与现场观测站相比，机器人网络的运营成本大大降低，覆盖广泛纵向基线的网络对于避免可变源的昼夜和季节周期计数模糊性至关重要。德克萨斯农工大学商学院的马特·伍德博士打算增强东南天文学研究协会（SARA）望远镜联盟运营的设施，其中已经包括基特峰国家天文台的0.9 m反射器和塞罗托洛洛美洲天文台的0.6 m望远镜，以及最近获得的1.0 m雅各布斯卡普坦望远镜（JKT）位于加那利群岛拉帕尔马罗克德洛斯穆查乔斯天文台&形成一个覆盖90多个经度的三望远镜机器人望远镜网络。 新望远镜将配备改进的副镜，升级的望远镜驱动器和编码器，CCD测光相机，以及与其他SARA望远镜相同的圆顶控制/天气监测软件。 要启用的科学非常适合于新兴的时域天文学领域：小行星、激变变星和其他类型的双星、活动星系核和伽马射线爆发事件，并包括已经是联盟天文学家研究重点的主题。JKT的远程操作预计将使SARA在11名成员的联盟中增加至少4名新成员，并将扩大确保成员教师和学生有机会获得多功能，有能力的观测设施的理念。这些机构的天文学和物理学部门相对较小，在国家研究竞技场中代表性通常不足，但它们是科学研究的重要教学论坛，因为它们允许本科生和研究生利用财团设施进行论文和顶点项目。能够提前6小时在东海岸的设施进行远程观测也将提高SARA在美国进行公共宣传活动的能力。NSF的天文科学部通过参与重大研究仪器计划为原型光谱仪的开发和建造提供资金。