Telescope Beam Simulator

天文望远镜的新仪器（如拍摄图像的照相机、分析成分和运动的摄谱仪以及测量磁场的偏振计）的开发正在进行中。新技术承诺更高的灵敏度或分辨率，而且往往成本更低。在LJMU，我们拥有并运营着世界上最大的机器人望远镜（“利物浦望远镜”），该望远镜位于西班牙加那利群岛的拉帕尔马岛。为了保持望远镜的科学竞争力，我们必须不断升级和更换仪器，以利用新技术。我们还为世界各地有类似目标的其他望远镜制造仪器。目前，我们使用复杂的光线跟踪软件来预测我们的仪器在运送到望远镜时的工作情况。然而，该软件不能预测商用现成组件的性能，这些组件虽然具有低成本的巨大优势，但通常具有专有设计。因此，我们希望购买一个“望远镜光束模拟器”，在将它们运往海外之前，将模拟的天空图像投射到实验室的新仪器上。这将使我们能够在沿着测试我们的仪器，提高它们的质量并节省海外旅行的时间，这意味着望远镜可以更多地用于科学，更少地用于工程工作。我们还可以将模拟器放入测试室，在那里我们可以改变温度，从而检查仪器在寒冷的冬夜是否能像在实验室的室温下一样工作。

The development of new instruments (such as cameras which take images, spectrographs which analyse compositions and motions, and polarimeters which measure magnetic fields) for astronomical telescopes is an ongoing effort. New technologies promise greater sensitivities or resolutions and often lower costs. At LJMU we own and operate the world's largest robotic telescope ("The Liverpool Telescope") which is sited on the Spanish Canary Island of La Palma. To keep the telescope scientifically competitive, we must continually upgrade and replace its instruments to take advantage of new technologies. We also build instrumentation for other telescopes around the world who have similar goals.Currently we use sophisticated ray-tracing software to predict how well our instruments will work when we transport them out to the telescope. However this software can not predict the performance of commercial off the shelf components, which, while having the great advantage of low cost, often have proprietary designs. We therefore wish to buy a "telescope beam simulator" than will project a simulated image of the sky onto our new instruments in the laboratory before shipping them overseas. This will allow us to test our instruments as we go along, improving their quality and saving time on overseas trips, meaning the telescope can be used more for science and less for engineering work. We will also be able to place the simulator into a test chamber where we can alter the temperature and so check that the instrument will work as well on a cold winters night as it does in the room temperature of the laboratory where it was built.