Related papers: The stellar scintillation on large and extremely l…
The serendipitous detection of stellar occultations by Outer Solar System objects is a powerful method for ascertaining the small end ($r \lesssim 15$ km) of the size distribution of Kuiper Belt Objects and may potentially allow the…
The present `state of the art' and the path to future progress in high spatial resolution imaging interferometry is reviewed. The review begins with a treatment of the fundamentals of stellar optical interferometry, the origin, properties,…
We present an analysis of the science image quality obtained on the twin 6.5 metre Magellan telescopes over a 1.5 year period, using images of ~10^5 stars. We find that the telescopes generally obtain significantly better image quality than…
We propose design of a low-cost passive scintillometer that measures the strength of optical turbulence by analyzing scintillation in the image of a straight edge between the two areas of uniform, but distinct brightness. Two theoretical…
Adaptive optics will almost completely remove the effects of atmospheric turbulence at 10 microns on the Extremely Large Telescope (ELT) generation of telescopes. In this paper, we observationally confirm that the next most important…
Instabilities and turbulence extending to the smallest dynamical scales play important roles in the deposition of energy and momentum by gravity waves throughout the atmosphere. However, these dynamics and their effects have been impossible…
Small Solar system Objects (SSOs) preserve the physical, chemical, and dynamical signatures of the Sun's protoplanetary disk. Upcoming surveys will discover vast numbers of new objects, yet their scientific value will depend on follow-up…
This paper presents a preliminary analysis of the turbulence spectrum of the solar wind in the near-Sun region R < 50 Rs, obtained from interplanetary scintillation measurements with the Ooty Radio Telescope at 327 MHz. The results clearly…
Just as turbulence in the Earth's atmosphere can severely limit the angular resolution of optical telescopes, turbulence in the ionized interstellar medium fundamentally limits the resolution of radio telescopes. We present a scattering…
Tsinghua-NAOC (National Astronomical Observatories of China) Telescope (hereafter, TNT) is an 80-cm Cassegrain reflecting telescope located at Xinglong bservatory of NAOC, with main scientific goals of monitoring various transients in the…
Unavoidable variations in size and position of the building blocks of photonic crystals cause light scattering and extinction of coherent beams. We present a new model for both 2 and 3-dimensional photonic crystals that relates the…
The next generation of adaptive optics (AO) systems will require tomographic reconstruction techniques to map the optical refractive index fluctuations, generated by the atmospheric turbulence, along the line of sight to the astronomical…
The South Pole Telescope (SPT) is a 10 m diameter, wide-field, offset Gregorian telescope with a 966-pixel, multi-color, millimeter-wave, bolometer camera. It is located at the Amundsen-Scott South Pole station in Antarctica. The design of…
The Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST) is conceived as an 8.4-m telescope with CCD or CMOS focal plane covering most of a field 0.6 m in diameter, the latter exceeding the size of the largest photographic plates ever used in astronomy.…
Astronomers usually need the highest angular resolution possible, but the blurring effect of diffraction imposes a fundamental limit on the image quality from any single telescope. Interferometry allows light collected at widely-separated…
We present the initial results of an observational study into the variation of the dominant length-scale of quiet solar emission: supergranulation. This length-scale reflects the radiative energy in the plasma of the upper solar…
Deflection of light along the optical path is a major source of image degradation for ground-based telescopes. Methods have been developed to measure upper atmospheric seeing based on models of the turbulence in the atmosphere, but due to…
The strength and vertical distribution of atmospheric turbulence is a key factor determining the performance of optical and infrared telescopes, with and without adaptive optics. Yet, this remains challenging to measure. We describe a new…
The location of an astronomical observatory is a key factor that affects its scientific productivity. The best astronomical sites are generally those found at high altitudes. Several such sites in western China and the Tibetan plateau are…
In this work we present an observational technique and a detailed analysis of the stellar interferograms produced by three bright stars: Betelgeuse, Rigel and Sirius. It is shown that the atmospheric turbulence is responsible for the…