Collaborative Research: Exploring Gas throughout the Milky Way Galaxy and Magellanic System of Galaxies with the WHAM-South Telescope

这项工作的合作者将使用一架名为WHAM的望远镜来完成一项长期项目，绘制银河系和附近被称为麦哲伦云的“卫星”星系的温暖气体。这架望远镜的设计相当不寻常，是专门为此目的而建造的。WHAM主要是在国家科学基金会的资助下建造、维护和运行了20年。WHAM为一大批年轻研究人员带来了博士后学位和活跃的科学事业。在亚利桑那州的基特峰天文台（Kitt Peak Observatory）待了十年之后，该望远镜现在位于智利。它是远程操作的（通过互联网），可以通过不同的原子和离子（带电原子）产生的光绘制银河系的地图。由于这种温暖的气体是星系的重要组成部分，天文学家可以更好地了解星系是如何变化的，并可以测试它是如何形成和演变的理论。研究生和本科生将继续作为运营团队的一部分参与数据收集和分析。这是威斯康星大学麦迪逊分校和博尔德空间科学研究所的一个合作项目，旨在继续支持威斯康星h - α成像仪（WHAM）的运行，这是一个远程控制的设施，专门用于探测和研究银河系盘和晕中的微弱光学发射线。WHAM设备由一个15厘米孔径双标准子fabry - pacrit光谱仪和一个60厘米孔径sidrostat组成，它们一起提供天空的1度视场，并在200公里/秒的光谱窗口中产生12公里/秒的分辨率光谱。CCD相机充当多通道探测器，无需扫描即可将光谱记录为法布里-帕姆罗特“环形图像”。WHAM于1997年1月开始在基特峰运行，从那里它测量了整个北方天空的h - α辐射（WHAM- sky Survey，或WHAM- ss）。还获得了其他诊断发射线中各个区域的补充观测结果。WHAM随后进行了翻新，并搬迁到智利的Cerro Tololo，于2009年3月实现了第一次南方照明。WHAM-SS已经完成，其他线（[SII]和[NII]）的观测也已经开始。有了这份合同，该团队将完成[SII]和[NII]的测绘，并将WHAM （H-alpha）调查扩展到更大的速度。总体目标是完成现有的调查，并支持当前学生完成现有的项目。合并的数据集将用于探测扩散电离气体（DIG）和热电离介质（WIM）的组成、温度、加热和电离。该小组将调查这些成分与活跃恒星形成区域之间的关系。WHAM设备还可以用于研究地球大气、彗星、黄道带尘埃和月球钠。

The collaborators on this endeavor will use a telescope called WHAM to complete a long-term project to map the warm gas in the Milky Way Galaxy and nearby "satellite" galaxies known as the Magellanic Clouds. The telescope is a rather unusual design and was built specifically for this purpose. WHAM was constructed and has been maintained and operated for 20 years primarily with NSF funding. WHAM has led to Postdoctoral degrees and active careers in science for a large number of young researchers. After a decade at the Kitt Peak Observatory in Arizona the telescope is now located in Chile. It is operated remotely (over the internet) and can map the Milky Way in the light produced by different atoms and ions (charged atoms). Since this warm gas is an important component of the galaxy, astronomers can better understand how the galaxy is changing and can test theories of how it was formed and how it is evolving. Graduate and undergraduate students will continue to be involved in data collection and analysis as part of the operations team.This is a collaborative project from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the Space Science Institute in Boulder that seeks to continue operations support for the Wisconsin H-Alpha Mapper (WHAM), a remotely controlled facility that is dedicated to the detection and study of faint optical emission lines in the disk and halo of the Milky Way.  The WHAM facility consists of a 15 cm aperture dual-etalon Fabry-Pérot spectrometer coupled to a 60 cm aperture siderostat, which together provide a one-degree field-of-view on the sky and produce a 12 km/s resolution spectrum across a 200 km/s spectral window.  A CCD camera serves as a multichannel detector, recording the spectrum as a Fabry-Pérot "ring image" without scanning. WHAM began operations on Kitt Peak in January 1997 from where it surveyed H-alpha emission throughout the entire northern sky (the WHAM-Sky Survey, or WHAM-SS). Complementary observations of various regions in other diagnostic emission lines were also obtained. WHAM has subsequently been refurbished and moved to Cerro Tololo, Chile, achieving first southern light in March 2009. The WHAM-SS has since been completed, and observations in other lines ([SII] and [NII]) have begun. With this award the team will complete mapping in [SII] and [NII], and extend the WHAM (H-alpha) survey to broader velocities. The overarching goal is to complete existing surveys and support current students through to the completion of existing projects. The combined datasets will be used to probe the composition, temperature, heating, and ionization of the Diffuse Ionized Gas (DIG) and Warm Ionized Medium (WIM). The team will investigate the relationship between these components and regions of active star formation. The WHAM facility can also be used to study the earth's atmosphere, comets, zodiacal dust, and lunar sodium.