Antarctic Schmidt Telescopes (AST3) for Dome A

Cui, Xiangqun; Yuan, Xiangyan; Gong, Xiaoli

doi:10.1117/12.789458

Cited by 36 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 3 publications

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“…Follow-up photometry with a finer pixel scale will be required to ensure that these blends are not responsible for the observed variability. Future telescopes planned for Dome A will yield a considerably finer pixel scale which will mitigate this problem (AST3; Cui et al 2008). Additionally, we are implementing a difference-imaging photometry pipeline that will enable a more robust detection of variables in crowded environments and will deliver higher photometric precision.…”

Section: Blendingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Photometry of Variable Stars From Dome A, Antarctica

Wang

Macri

Krisciunas

et al. 2011

The Astronomical Journal

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Dome A on the Antarctic plateau is likely one of the best observing sites on Earth thanks to the excellent atmospheric conditions present at the site during the long polar winter night. We present high-cadence time-series aperture photometry of 10,000 stars with i < 14.5 mag located in a 23 deg 2 region centered on the south celestial pole. The photometry was obtained with one of the CSTAR telescopes during 128 days of the 2008 Antarctic winter. We used this photometric data set to derive site statistics for Dome A and to search for variable stars. Thanks to the nearly uninterrupted synoptic coverage, we found six times as many variables as previous surveys with similar magnitude limits. We detected 157 variable stars, of which 55% were unclassified, 27% were likely binaries, and 17% were likely pulsating stars. The latter category includes δ Scuti, γ Doradus, and RR Lyrae variables. One variable may be a transiting exoplanet.

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Section: Blendingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Photometry of Variable Stars From Dome A, Antarctica

Wang

Macri

Krisciunas

et al. 2011

The Astronomical Journal

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“…The Antarctic Schmidt Telescope (AST3) project comprises three 68 cm (50 cm non-vignetted aperture) equatorial-mount telescopes located at the Kunlun Station at Dome A, Antarctica (Cui, Yuan, & Gong 2008). The second of the AST3 telescopes, AST3-2, employs a 10 K×10 K STA1600FT camera with a pixel scale of 1 arcsec pixel −1 and a 4.14°field of view.…”

Section: Ast3-2mentioning

confidence: 99%

Follow Up of GW170817 and Its Electromagnetic Counterpart by Australian-Led Observing Programmes

Andreoni

Ackley

Cooke

et al. 2017

Publ. Astron. Soc. Aust.

185

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The discovery of the first electromagnetic counterpart to a gravitational wave signal has generated follow-up observations by over 50 facilities world-wide, ushering in the new era of multi-messenger astronomy. In this paper, we present follow-up observations of the gravitational wave event GW170817 and its electromagnetic counterpart SSS17a/DLT17ck (IAU label AT2017gfo) by 14 Australian telescopes and partner observatories as part of Australian-based and Australian-led research programs. We report early-to late-time multi-wavelength observations, including optical imaging and spectroscopy, midinfrared imaging, radio imaging, and searches for fast radio bursts. Our optical spectra reveal that the transient source emission cooled from approximately 6 400 K to 2 100 K over a 7-d period and produced no significant optical emission lines. The spectral profiles, cooling rate, and photometric light curves are consistent with the expected outburst and subsequent processes of a binary neutron star merger. Star formation in the host galaxy probably ceased at least a Gyr ago, although there is evidence for a galaxy merger. Binary pulsars with short (100 Myr) decay times are therefore unlikely progenitors, but pulsars like PSR B1534+12 with its 2.7 Gyr coalescence time could produce such a merger. The displacement (∼2.2 kpc) of the binary star system from the centre of the main galaxy is not unusual for stars in the host galaxy or stars originating in the merging galaxy, and therefore any constraints on the kick velocity imparted to the progenitor are poor.

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“…AST3 consists of three wide-field 0.5/0.68m modified Schmidt telescopes with f-ratio f/3.73. 5,6 These catadioptric telescopes were designed for wide field-of-view (4.3 sq. degrees) survey with a shorter tube than traditional Schmitt telescope.…”

Section: Send Correspondence To Zhaohui Shang: Zshang@gmailcommentioning

confidence: 99%

Problems with twilight/supersky flat-field for wide-field robotic telescopes and the solution

Wei

Shang

et al. 2014

SPIE Proceedings

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Twilight/night sky images are often used for flat-fielding CCD images, but the brightness gradient in twilight/night sky causes problems of accurate flat-field correction in astronomical images for wide-field telescopes. Using data from the Antarctic Survey Telescope (AST3), we found that when the sky brightness gradient is minimum and stable, there is still a gradient of 1% across AST3's field-of-view of 4.3 square degrees. We tested various approaches to remove the varying gradients in individual flat-field images. Our final optimal method can reduce the spatially dependent errors caused by the gradient to the negligible level. We also suggest a guideline of flat-fielding using twilight/night sky images for wide-field robotic autonomous telescopes.

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Antarctic Schmidt Telescopes (AST3) for Dome A

Cited by 36 publications

References 3 publications

Photometry of Variable Stars From Dome A, Antarctica

Photometry of Variable Stars From Dome A, Antarctica

Follow Up of GW170817 and Its Electromagnetic Counterpart by Australian-Led Observing Programmes

Problems with twilight/supersky flat-field for wide-field robotic telescopes and the solution

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