Related papers: Astronomical technology - the past and the future
Ongoing microlensing surveys have already yielded more than five hundred microlensing events, most of which have been identified in real-time. In this review I present the basic theory and observational status of these surveys. I highlight…
Digital radio detection of cosmic rays has made tremendous progress over the past decade. It has become increasingly clear where the potential --- but also the limitations --- of the technique lie. In this article, we discuss roads that…
We examine the historical development of astrophysical science in Antarctica from the early 20th century until today. We find three temporally overlapping eras, each having a rather distinct beginning. These are the astrogeological era of…
Modern imaging technologies are widely based on classical principles of light or electromagnetic wave propagation. They can be remarkably sophisticated, with recent successes ranging from single molecule microscopy to imaging far-distant…
This review provides an overview of many recent advances in detector technologies for particle physics experiments. Challenges for new technologies include increasing spatial and temporal sensitivity, speed, and radiation hardness while…
The new generation of ground-based, large-aperture solar telescopes promises to significantly increase our capabilities to understand the many basic phenomena taking place in the Sun at all atmospheric layers and how they relate to each…
Technology has, without doubt, expanded our understanding of space. The Voyager 1 space probe is on the brink of leaving our solar system. Massive telescopes have discovered blasts of fast radio bursts from 10 billion light years away. And…
With its immensity and numerous mysteries waiting to be solved, the cosmos has always captivated humankind. A ground-breaking field that has given us a profound understanding of the mysteries of the cosmos is radio astronomy. This paper…
Gravitational-wave astronomy will soon become a new tool for observing the Universe. Detecting and interpreting gravitational waves will require deep theoretical insights into astronomical sources. The past three decades have seen…
The changing heavens have played a central role in the scientific effort of astronomers for centuries. Galileo's synoptic observations of the moons of Jupiter and the phases of Venus starting in 1610, provided strong refutation of Ptolemaic…
I argue that there is a crisis in optical Astronomy due to a paucity of telescopes and thus the need for a paradigm shift in telescope technology. Large increases in collecting areas and observing time/astronomer are only possible if we…
Astronomy began as a visual science, first through careful observations of the sky using either an eyepiece or the naked eye, then on to the preservation of those images with photographic media and finally the digital encoding of that…
Observational astronomy has shown significant growth over the last decade and has made important contributions to cosmology. A major paradigm shift in cosmology was brought about by observations of Type Ia supernovae. The notion that the…
The science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke wrote, "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." While not magical by any means, the technology used to detect gravitational waves starting in 2015 is surely…
The next decade will be an exciting period for solar astrophysics, as new ground- and space-based instrumentation will provide unprecedented observations of the solar atmosphere and heliosphere. The synergy between modeling effort and…
Started approximately in the late 1980s, exoplanetology has up to now unveiled the main gross bulk characteristics of planets and planetary systems. In the future it will benefit from more and more large telescopes and advanced space…
Ground-based gamma-ray astronomy has experienced a major breakthrough in the last decade thanks to the advent of new generation instruments such as H.E.S.S., MAGIC, Milagro and VERITAS. A large variety of cosmic particle accelerators has…
The first decade of the new millenium should see the first direct detections of gravitational waves. This will be a milestone for fundamental physics and it will open the new observational science of gravitational wave astronomy. But…
Having driven a large part of the decade's progress in physics, nanoelectronics is now passing from today's realm of the extraordinary to tomorrow's commonplace. This carries the problem of turning proofs of concept into practical…
Gravitational time delays, observed in strong lens systems where the variable background source is multiply-imaged by a massive galaxy in the foreground, provide direct measurements of cosmological distance that are very complementary to…