An Off-Axis Telescope Concept for Antarctic Astronomy

• Main Authors: Gil Moretto, Nicolas Epchtein, Maud Langlois, Isabelle Vauglin
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: infrared cases for Antarctica; off-axis telescope; low scattered light; low emissivity; Antarctic; The Antarctic; Antarc*; Antarctica
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.392.9660; http://hal.inria.fr/docs/00/74/09/37/PDF/SPIE12_8444_206.pdf

The Antarctic plateau offers exceptional atmospheric and environmental conditions for astronomical observations over a wide range of wavelengths and uniquely favorable to infrared astronomy. Exceptional low sky brightness throughout the near- and mid-infrared and a telescope facility complying with the highest possible dynamic range for photometry, angular resolution and the wide-field leads to the possibility of a modest-sized 2m off-axis telescope achieving comparable sensitivity to that of a larger ground-based 8-10m class telescope or a same sized space-based ones.