US Community Access to the Large Millimeter Telescope

在毫米波波段对天体源的天文观测解决了一系列重要的科学问题。美国有一个活跃的天文学家团体，他们对进行这项研究有浓厚的兴趣，因此需要使用世界级的毫米波天文望远镜。该项目将为美国社区提供一个直径50米的毫米波望远镜，即Alfonso Serrano大型毫米波望远镜（LMT） 15%的科学观测时间。LMT是由马萨诸塞大学阿姆赫斯特分校和墨西哥国家合作建造的，他们分担了建造望远镜的资本成本，目前也分享了该设施的科学使用。美国天文学家访问位于世界其他地方的类似设施的机会非常有限，因此访问LMT为不同领域的工作提供了重要的新机会，例如研究银河系演化，时变物体以及银河系和其他附近星系中恒星的形成。LMT是一个与墨西哥两国合作的项目，开放访问望远镜所带来的机会有望促进美国与其南部邻国之间的科学联系和合作。此外，参与该计划的教育机构，马萨诸塞大学阿默斯特分校、马里兰大学帕克分校和墨西哥国家天文、光学和电子研究所，都有通过实践工作和直接参与项目来吸引学生和培训下一代科学家的强大传统。该计划的主要目标是为美国社区提供LMT上15%的科学观测时间。将根据公开的、同行评审的提案竞赛的结果选择项目进行观察时间。开放获取项目的观察将由训练有素的LMT观察员进行，数据产品将提供给该设施的开放获取用户。LMT拥有最先进的仪器，在波长为4毫米和0.85毫米之间的大气窗口中工作，并且在ALMA波段4-6中拥有世界上最大的单碟有效面积。新的TolTEC仪器是一个多波长连续照相机和7000像素的偏振计，将比ALMA快几千倍完成对天空的调查。光谱线测绘调查也将获得表面亮度灵敏度和速度超过ALMA的能力，并在高红移宇宙中进行分子气体的无偏光谱调查。LMT提供了开展“独立”科学的机会，也为ALMA提供了重要的补充作用，通过提供数据集，将增强ALMA对美国社区的科学回报。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Astronomical observations of celestial sources at millimeter wavelengths address a broad range of important scientific questions. The United States has an active community of astronomers with strong interests in pursuing this research, creating a need for access to world-class telescopes for millimeter-wave astronomy. This project will provide the US community with open access to 15% of the scientific observing time on a 50m-diameter, millimeter-wave telescope: the Large Millimeter Telescope Alfonso Serrano (LMT). The LMT was constructed in a collaboration between the University of Massachusetts Amherst and the country of Mexico, who shared the capital cost of building the telescope and currently share in the scientific use of the facility. US astronomer access to comparable facilities, located elsewhere in the world, has been extremely limited, so access to the LMT provides a significant new opportunity for work in diverse areas such as studies of galactic evolution, time variable objects, and the formation of stars in the Milky Way and other nearby galaxies. LMT is a project carried out in a binational collaboration with the country of Mexico, and the opportunities presented by open access to the telescope are expected to boost scientific contact and collaborations between the United States and its southern neighbor. In addition, the educational institutions involved in the program, University of Massachusetts Amherst, University of Maryland College Park, and the Instituto Nacional de Astrofisica, Optica, y Electronica in Mexico, have strong traditions of engaging students and training the next generation of scientists through hands-on work and direct participation in the project.The primary objective of this program is to provide 15% of the scientific observing time on the LMT to the US Community. Projects will be selected for observing time based on the results of an open, peer-reviewed, proposal competition. Observations for open access projects will be carried out by trained LMT observers and data products will be provided to open access users of the facility. The LMT has state-of-the-art instruments operating in the atmospheric windows between wavelengths of 4 mm and 0.85 mm and has the largest single-dish effective area in the world in the ALMA Bands 4-6. The new TolTEC instrument, a multi-wavelength continuum camera and polarimeter with 7,000 pixels, will complete surveys of the sky thousands of times faster than ALMA. Spectral line mapping surveys will also be obtained with surface brightness sensitivity and speeds exceeding ALMA capabilities, and unbiased spectroscopic surveys of molecular gas in the high redshift universe will be conducted. The LMT presents opportunities to carry out both “stand alone” science as well as playing an important complementary role to ALMA by providing data sets that will enhance the scientific return from ALMA for the US Community.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.