A new optical setup, based on the substitution of the secondary and tertiary mirror (M2-M3), will be installed during the Dome C Summer Campaign 2023-2024. These new optics (f/12) have been designed together with the MiR Optomechanical Engineering. The need for a faster focal ratio has been pointed out from the beginning of the activities and moreover after the end of AMICA instrument...
Cryoscope is a 1m scale infrared surveyor planned to carry out transient astronomy and gravitational wave follow up from Dome C. A quarter-size pathfinder is finishing contruction at Caltech and is planned for deployemnt at Dome C to carry out an early survey and retire technical risks of the full sized telescope.
In 2018, the Greenland Telescope (GLT) started scientific observation in Greenland. Since then, we have completed several significant improvements and added new capabilities to the telescope system. This paper presents a full review of the GLT system, a summary of our observation activities since 2018, the lessons learned from the operations in the Arctic regions, and the prospect of the telescope.
Dome A, Antarctica is expected as the best site on earth for infrared observations, due to its cold atmosphere and excellent seeing. We have built two small telescopes as a pathfinder for infrared astronomy at Dome A. The telescopes have diameters of 15 cm, with fields of view of 1.2 square degrees. They are equipped with commercial InGaAs cameras and J/H filters, respectively. They have been...
The optical properties of dust are central to a wide class of astrophysical objects and the interpretation and modeling of observations, the study of protoplanetary disks being just one example. The development of infrared (IR) astronomy, including observations from Antarctica, will produce a huge amount of data from micron-sized dust, with important implications for radiative transfer...
The 39th CHINARE returned to Dome A after four years. We maintained the site testing instruments, including seeing monitor KL-DIMM, all-sky camera KLCAM, and multi-layer weather station KLAWS-2G. PLATO-A and the main control and data system for instruments were also serviced. All the unattended instruments are working well and collecting data. We will summarize the field work related to...
The astronomical seeing is caused by atmospheric turbulence, which is concentrated on the boundary layer. The boundary layer could hardly be avoided even at the best mid-latitude sites, because it is as thick as hundreds of meters from the ground. However, the boundary layer at Dome A, Antarctica could be as thin as ten meters, therefore excellent seeing around 0.3 arcsec is possible to be...
Artist Tristan Duke will share work from his ongoing interdisciplinary, research-based project Glacial Optics. In 2022 the artist undertook an expedition to the arctic where he made functioning camera lenses out of glacier ice, capturing portraits of the glaciers through their own ice. Subsequently the artist has worked with the NSF Ice Core facility and the Wisconsin IceCube Particle...
Dome A, the highest point of the Antarctic plateau, is one of best astronomical sites in the world. From 2008, China established a scientific site at Dome A and started time-domain photometry surveys, e.g. CSTAR and AST3. The exoplanet and variable searching programs are two of the major scientific aims of the AST3-II telescope. In 2019, the first data release of CHESPA (Chinese Exoplanet...
