ALMA: status report on construction and early results from commissioning

Richard E. Hills; Richard J. Kurz; Alison B. Peck

doi:10.1117/12.857017

28 July 2010 ALMA: status report on construction and early results from commissioning

Richard E. Hills, Richard J. Kurz, Alison B. Peck

Proceedings Volume 7733, Ground-based and Airborne Telescopes III; 773317 (2010) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.857017
Event: SPIE Astronomical Telescopes + Instrumentation, 2010, San Diego, California, United States

Abstract

The Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) is an international facility at an advanced stage of construction in the Atacama region of northern Chile. ALMA will consist of two arrays of high-precision antennas: one made up of twelve 7-meter diameter antennas operating in closely-packed configurations of about 50m in diameter, and the other of up to sixty-four 12-meter antennas arranged in configurations with diameters ranging from about 150 meters to 15 km. There will be four more 12-meter antennas to provide the "zero-spacing" information, which is critical for making accurate images of extended objects. The antennas will be equipped with sensitive millimeter-wave receivers covering most of the frequency range 84 to 950 GHz. State-of-the-art microwave, digital, photonic and software systems will capture the signals, transfer them to the central building and correlate them, while maintaining accurate synchronization. ALMA will provide images of a wide range of astronomical objects with great sensitivity and very high spectral resolution. The images will have much higher "fidelity" than those from existing mm/submm telescopes. This paper gives an update on the status of construction and on progress with the testing and scientific commissioning.

Citation Download Citation

Richard E. Hills, Richard J. Kurz, and Alison B. Peck "ALMA: status report on construction and early results from commissioning", Proc. SPIE 7733, Ground-based and Airborne Telescopes III, 773317 (28 July 2010); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.857017

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