Related papers: Fringe tracking performance monitoring: FINITO at …
At the Very Large Telescope Interferometer, the purpose of the fringe-tracker FINITO is to stabilize the optical path differences between the beams, allowing longer integration times on the scientific instruments AMBER and MIDI. Our goal is…
Measurement of interferometric parameters values is affected by phase disturbance due especially to atmospheric turbulences. Algorithms of fringe sensing, aimed at fringe parameters identification, are based on interferometric models that…
AIMS: We have found that the interferometric visibilities of VLTI-AMBER observations, extracted via the standard reduction package, are significantly biased when faint targets are concerned. The visibility biases derive from a time variable…
The VLTI Spectro Imager project aims to perform imaging with a temporal resolution of 1 night and with a maximum angular resolution of 1 milliarcsecond, making best use of the Very Large Telescope Interferometer capabilities. To fulfill the…
Context. With the arrival of the next generation of ground-based imaging interferometers combining from 4 to possibly 6 telescopes simultaneously, there is also a strong need for a new generation of fringe trackers able to cophase such…
Our goal is to demonstrate the potential of the interferometric AMBER instrument linked with the Very Large Telescope Interferometer (VLTI) fringe-tracking facility FINITO to derive high-precision stellar diameters. We use commissioning…
The GRAVITY instrument has been commissioned on the VLTI during 2016 and is now available to the astronomical community. It is the first optical interferometer capable of observing sources as faint as magnitude 19 in K-band. This is…
This tutorial gives a general introduction to optical and infrared interferometry, specifically addressing two questions: `Can I use VLTI to observe my favourite object?' and `What will it tell me?' The observables measured by an…
Context: A turbulent atmosphere causes atmospheric piston variations leading to rapid changes in the optical path difference of an interferometer, which causes correlated flux losses. This leads to decreased sensitivity and accuracy in the…
The implementation of fringe tracking for optical interferometers is inevitable when optimal exploitation of the instrumental capacities is desired. Fringe tracking allows continuous fringe observation, considerably increasing the…
The implementation of the simultaneous combination of several telescopes (from four to eight) available at Very Large Telescope Interferometer (VLTI) will allow the new generation interferometric instrumentation to achieve interferometric…
The AMBER instrument installed at the Very Large Telescope (VLT) combines three beams from as many telescopes to produce spectrally dispersed fringes from milli-arcsecond angular scale in the near infrared. Two years after installation,…
To enable optical long baseline interferometry toward faint objects, long integrations are necessary despite atmospheric turbulence. Fringe trackers are needed to stabilize the fringes and thus increase the fringe visibility and phase…
We present in this paper an innovative data reduction method for single-mode interferometry. It has been specifically developed for the AMBER instrument, the three-beam combiner of the Very Large Telescope Interferometer, but can be derived…
We present here the current performances of the AMBER / VLTI instrument for standard use and compare these with the offered modes of the instrument. We show that the instrument is able to reach its specified precision only for medium and…
Interferometric observations with three telescopes or more provide two observables: closure phase information together with visibilities measurements. When using single-mode interferometers, both observables have to be redefined in the…
The fringe sensor unit (FSU) is the central element of the phase referenced imaging and micro-arcsecond astrometry (PRIMA) dual-feed facility for the Very Large Telescope interferometer (VLTI). It has been installed at the Paranal…
In a few years, the second generation instruments of the Very Large Telescope Interferometer (VLTI) will routinely provide observations with 4 to 6 telescopes simultaneously. To reach their ultimate performance, they will need a fringe…
The Fringe Sensor Unit (FSU) is the central element of the Phase Referenced Imaging and Micro-arcsecond Astrometry (PRIMA) dual-feed facility and provides fringe sensing for all observation modes, comprising off-axis fringe tracking, phase…
The limiting magnitude is a key issue for optical interferometry. Pairwise fringe trackers based on the integrated optics concepts used for example in GRAVITY seem limited to about K=10.5 with the 8m Unit Telescopes of the VLTI, and there…