Related papers: Submm/FIR astronomy in Antarctica: Potential for a…
Over the past few years a major effort has been put into the exploration of potential sites for the deployment of submillimetre astronomical facilities. Amongst the most important sites are Dome C and Dome A on the Antarctic Plateau, and…
Dome A in Antarctica has been demonstrated to be the best site on earth for optical, infrared, and terahertz astronomical observations by more and more evidence, such as excellent free-atmosphere seeing, extremely low perceptible water…
Recent site testing (see: http://www-luan.unice.fr/Concordiastro/indexantartic.html) has shown that Dome C in Antarctica might have a high potential for stellar interferometry if some solutions related to the surface atmospheric layer are…
Antarctica provides a unique environment for astronomy. The cold, dry and stable air found above the high plateau, as well as the pure ice below, offers new opportunities across the photon & particle spectrum. The summits of the plateau…
The cold, dry and stable air above the summits of the Antarctic plateau provides the best ground-based observing conditions from optical to sub-mm wavelengths to be found on the Earth. PILOT is a proposed 2 m telescope, to be built at Dome…
Due to the recent interest shown by astronomers towards the Antarctic Plateau as a potential site for large astronomical facilities, we assisted in the last years to a strengthening of site testing activities in this region, particularly at…
Antarctica offers unique conditions for ground-based observations, such as low sky background in the infrared, improved seeing, and low turbulence and scintillation noise. These properties are particularly beneficial to imaging, precision…
PILOT (the Pathfinder for an International Large Optical Telescope) is a proposed 2.5 m optical/infrared telescope to be located at Dome C on the Antarctic plateau. Conditions at Dome C are known to be exceptional for astronomy. The seeing…
Preliminary site testing at Dome C (Antarctica) is presented, using both Automatic Weather Station (AWS) meteorological data (1986-1993) and Precipitable Water Vapor (PWV) measurements made by the authors. A comparison with South Pole and…
Submillimetre/TeraHertz (e.g. 200, 350, 450 microns) astronomy is the prime technique to unveil the birth and early evolution of a broad range of astrophysical objects. A major obstacle to carry out submm observations from ground is the…
The Antarctic plateau contains the best sites on earth for many forms of astronomy, but none of the existing bases was selected with astronomy as the primary motivation. In this article, we try to systematically compare the merits of…
Surveys provide a wealth of data to the astronomical community that are used well after their completion. In this paper, we propose a project that would take the maximum benefit of Dome C in Antarctica by performing two surveys, in the…
The terahertz and far-infrared (FIR) band, from approximately 0.3 THz to 15 THz (1 mm to 20 micron), is important for astrophysics as the thermal radiation of much of the universe peaks at these wavelengths and many spectral lines that…
The Antarctic Multiband Infrared Camera (AMICA) is a double channel camera operating in the 2-28 micron infrared domain (KLMNQ bands) that will allow to characterize and exploit the exceptional advantages for Astronomy, expected from Dome C…
PILOT (the Pathfinder for an International Large Optical Telescope) is a proposed 2.5 m optical/infrared telescope to be located at Dome C on the Antarctic plateau. The atmospheric conditions at Dome C deliver a high sensitivity, high…
Seeing, the angular size of stellar images blurred by atmospheric turbulence, is a critical parameter used to assess the quality of astronomical sites. Median values at the best mid-latitude sites are generally in the range of…
We present Cryoscope--a new 50 deg$^2$ field-of-view, 1.2 m aperture, $K_{dark}$ survey telescope to be located at Dome C, Antarctica. Cryoscope has an innovative optical-thermal design wherein the entire telescope is cryogenically cooled.…
Context. Dome Fuji, the second highest region on the Antarctic plateau, is expected to have some of the best astronomical seeing on Earth. However, site testing at Dome Fuji is still in its very early stages. Aims. To investigate the…
Atmospheric transmission from Dome A, Antarctica, presents new possibilities in the field of terahertz astronomy, where space telescopes have been the only observational tools until now. Using atmospheric transmission measurements from Dome…
The recent discovery of exceptional seeing conditions at Dome C, Antarctica, raises the possibility of constructing an optical observatory there with unique capabilities. However, little is known from an astronomer's perspective about the…