Misplaced Pages

#215784

49-684: AMBER , the Astronomical Multi-Beam Recombiner , is an instrument mounted on the Very Large Telescope (VLT), combining the light of the three Unit Telescopes in the near-infrared of the VLT-Interferometer (VLTI). It is at the source of a considerable number of publications in the field of optical long-baseline interferometry . It combines three out of the four telescopes of the VLTI, through

98-524: A spectrograph , making it a unique instrument, combining spectroscopy and interferometry . These properties, and the fact that AMBER is an open-community instrument, made it a successful instrument. It can be compared to its fellow in the mid-infrared, the MIDI instrument in terms of the number of publications. Highlights from the AMBER instrument include the first detection of a Keplerian-rotating disk around

147-416: A surface brightness high enough to be observed in the mid-infrared, and objects must be at several thousands of degrees Celsius for near-infrared observations using the VLTI. This includes most of the stars in the solar neighborhood and many extragalactic objects such as bright active galactic nuclei , but this sensitivity limit rules out interferometric observations of most solar-system objects. Although

196-524: A 1.1 metre lightweight beryllium secondary mirror. A flat tertiary mirror diverts the light to one of two instruments at the f/15 Nasmyth foci on either side, with a system focal length of 120 m, or the tertiary tilts aside to allow light through the primary mirror central hole to a third instrument at the Cassegrain focus. This allows switching between any of the three instruments within 5 minutes, to match observing conditions. Additional mirrors can send

245-567: A Be star, the discovery of disks around evolved stars, the characterization of the disks of young stars, the observations of novae, the sharpest images of evolved stars and the characterization of the central dusty torus of active galactic nuclei. As of the end of 2017, 150 refereed papers had been published using AMBER data. Very Large Telescope#Instruments The VLT is capable of observing both visible and infrared wavelengths . Each individual telescope can detect objects that are roughly four billion times fainter than what can be seen with

294-463: A Nasmyth telescope (i.e. to use the "Nasmyth Focus"). The twin 10-meter telescopes at W. M. Keck Observatory in Hawaii, the 8.2-meter Subaru Telescope sited next to them, the four 8.2-meter Unit Telescopes of ESO's Very Large Telescope and their predecessor the 3.6-meter New Technology Telescope are notable examples that support an array of specialized instruments on their Nasmyth platforms, with

343-589: A broken pump in a giant washing machine and resolving a rigging issue. The procedure is part of routine scheduled maintenance. The area surrounding the Very Large Telescope was featured in the 2008 film Quantum of Solace . The ESO Hotel , the Residencia, served as a backdrop for part of the James Bond movie. Producer Michael G. Wilson said: "The Residencia of Paranal Observatory caught

392-458: Is a reflecting telescope developed by the Scottish inventor James Nasmyth in 1845 . It is a modified form of a Cassegrain telescope , with light reflected sideways to an eyepiece. As in the Cassegrain telescope, the light falls on a concave primary mirror, then is reflected towards a convex secondary mirror. A comparatively small tertiary flat mirror reflects the light to one of the sides of

441-413: Is adjustable as a function of the telescope's pointing and the star's elevation above the horizon; therefore a heavy instrument can be used without upsetting the balance of the telescope or increasing the load on the altitude bearings. This has significant advantages for spectrographs and other heavy instruments typically used at research observatories. Most modern research telescopes can be configured into

490-471: Is done using 1.8 meter Auxiliary Telescopes (ATs), which are dedicated to full-time interferometric measurements. The first observations using a pair of ATs were conducted in February 2005, and all the four ATs have now been commissioned. For interferometric observations on the brightest objects, there is little benefit in using 8 meter telescopes rather than 1.8 meter telescopes. The first two instruments at

539-447: Is introduced, the limiting magnitude of the VLTI is expected to improve by a factor of almost 1000, reaching a magnitude of about 14. This is similar to what is expected for other fringe tracking interferometers. In spectroscopic mode, the VLTI can currently reach a magnitude of 1.5. The VLTI can work in a fully integrated way, so that interferometric observations are actually quite simple to prepare and execute. The VLTI has become worldwide

SECTION 10

#1732772320216

588-623: Is the gravitational redshift . In fact, the observation has been conducted for over 26 years with the SINFONI and NACO adaptive optics instruments in the VLT while the new approach in 2018 also used the beam-combiner instrument GRAVITY. The Galactic Centre team at the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics (MPE) used these observations to reveal these effects for the first time. Other discoveries with VLT's signature include

637-533: Is used to resolve small objects. The interferometer also includes a set of four 1.8 meter diameter movable telescopes dedicated to interferometric observations. The first of the UTs started operating in May 1998 and was offered to the astronomical community on 1 April 1999. The other telescopes became operational in 1999 and 2000, enabling multi-telescope VLT capability. Four 1.8-metre Auxiliary Telescopes (ATs) have been added to

686-626: The GRAVITY instrument on their Very Large Telescope Interferometer (VLTI), announced the first direct detection of an exoplanet , HR 8799 e , using optical interferometry . One of the large mirrors of the telescopes was the subject of an episode of the National Geographic Channel 's reality series World's Toughest Fixes , where a crew of engineers removed and transported the mirror to be cleaned and re-coated with aluminium . The job required battling strong winds, fixing

735-508: The VLTI using a complex system of mirrors in tunnels where the light paths must be kept equal within differences of less than 1 μm over a light path of a hundred metres. With this kind of precision, the VLTI can reconstruct images with an angular resolution of milliarcseconds. It had long been ESO's intention to provide "real" names to the four VLT Unit Telescopes, to replace the original technical designations of UT1 to UT4. In March 1999, at

784-468: The light wavelengths accessible from the surface of the Earth ), with the full range of techniques including high-resolution spectroscopy, multi-object spectroscopy , imaging, and high-resolution imaging. In particular, the VLT has several adaptive optics systems, which correct for the effects of atmospheric turbulence, providing images almost as sharp as if the telescope were in space. In the near-infrared,

833-509: The naked eye . When all the telescopes are combined, the facility can achieve an angular resolution of approximately 0.002 arcsecond. In single telescope mode, the angular resolution is about 0.05 arcseconds. The VLT is one of the most productive facilities for astronomy, second only to the Hubble Space Telescope in terms of the number of scientific papers produced from facilities operating at visible wavelengths. Some of

882-418: The VLTI lab, along with ESPRESSO fed via fibre-optics (not interferometric). From 2014 to 2020 it underwent a major upgrade to CRIRES+ to provide ten times larger simultaneous wavelength coverage. A new detector focal plane array of three Hawaii 2RG detectors with a 5.3 μm cut-off wavelength replaced the existing detectors, a new spectropolarimetric unit is added, and the calibration system is enhanced. One of

931-402: The VLTI to make it available when the UTs are being used for other projects. These ATs were installed and became operational between 2004 and 2007. The VLT's 8.2-meter telescopes were originally designed to operate in three modes: The UTs are equipped with a large set of instruments permitting observations to be performed from the near-ultraviolet to the mid-infrared (i.e. a large fraction of

980-496: The VLTI were VINCI (a test instrument used to set up the system, now decommissioned) and MIDI, which only allow two telescopes to be used at any one time. With the installation of the three-telescope AMBER closure-phase instrument in 2005, the first imaging observations from the VLTI are expected soon. Deployment of the Phase Referenced Imaging and Microarcsecond Astrometry (PRIMA) instrument started 2008 with

1029-424: The adaptive optics images of the VLT are up to three times sharper than those of the Hubble Space Telescope , and the spectroscopic resolution is many times better than Hubble. The VLTs are noted for their high level of observing efficiency and automation. The primary mirrors of the UTs are 8.2 meters in diameter but, in practice, the pupil of the telescopes is defined by their secondary mirrors, effectively reducing

SECTION 20

#1732772320216

1078-573: The aim to allow phase-referenced measurements in either an astrometric two-beam mode or as a fringe-tracker successor to VINCI, operated concurrent with one of the other instruments. After falling drastically behind schedule and failing to meet some specifications, in December 2004 the VLT Interferometer became the target of a second ESO "recovery plan". This involves additional effort concentrated on improvements to fringe tracking and

1127-586: The angular diameters of four red dwarfs including Proxima Centauri . During this operation it achieved an angular resolution of ±0.08 milli-arc-seconds (0.388 nano-radians). This is comparable to the resolution achieved using other arrays such as the Navy Prototype Optical Interferometer and the CHARA array . Unlike many earlier optical and infrared interferometers, the Astronomical Multi-Beam Recombiner (AMBER) instrument on VLTI

1176-454: The attention of our director, Marc Forster and production designer, Dennis Gassner, both for its exceptional design and its remote location in the Atacama desert. It is a true oasis and the perfect hide out for Dominic Greene, our villain, whom 007 is tracking in our new James Bond film." Nasmyth focus The Nasmyth telescope , also called Nasmyth–Cassegrain or Cassegrain–Nasmyth ,

1225-472: The cultural heritage of ESO's host country. The winning essay was submitted by 17-year-old Jorssy Albanez Castilla from Chuquicamata near the city of Calama . She received the prize, an amateur telescope, during the inauguration of the Paranal site. Unit Telescopes 1–4 are since known as Antu (Sun), Kueyen (Moon), Melipal ( Southern Cross ), and Yepun (Evening Star), respectively. Originally there

1274-542: The detection of carbon monoxide molecules in a galaxy located almost 11 billion light-years away for the first time, a feat that had remained elusive for 25 years. This has allowed astronomers to obtain the most precise measurement of the cosmic temperature at such a remote epoch. Another important study was that of the violent flares from the supermassive black hole at the centre of the Milky Way. The VLT and APEX teamed up to reveal material being stretched out as it orbits in

1323-465: The enclosure and transporter are mechanically isolated from the telescope, to ensure that no vibrations compromise the data collected. The transporter section runs on tracks, so the ATs can be moved to 30 different observing locations. As the VLTI acts rather like a single telescope as large as the group of telescopes combined, changing the positions of the ATs means that the VLTI can be adjusted according to

1372-407: The exoplanetary atmosphere . This important wavelength region is covered by CRIRES+, which will additionally allow tracking multiple absorption lines simultaneously. In its interferometric operating mode, the light from the telescopes is reflected off mirrors and directed through tunnels to a central beam combining laboratory. In the year 2001, during commissioning, the VLTI successfully measured

1421-430: The first extrasolar planet so imaged, tracking individual stars moving around the supermassive black hole at the centre of the Milky Way, and observing the afterglow of the furthest known gamma-ray burst . In 2018, the VLT helped to perform the first successful test of Albert Einstein 's General Relativity on the motion of a star passing through the extreme gravitational field near the supermassive black hole, that

1470-466: The first general user optical/infrared interferometric facility offered with this kind of service to the astronomical community. Because of the many mirrors involved in the optical train, about 95% of the light is lost before reaching the instruments at a wavelength of 1 μm, 90% at 2 μm and 75% at 10 μm. This refers to reflection off 32 surfaces including the Coudé train, the star separator,

1519-432: The first time using the VLT. The planet, which is known as GJ 1214b , was studied as it passed in front of its parent star and some of the starlight passed through the planet's atmosphere. In all, of the top 10 discoveries done at ESO's observatories, seven made use of the VLT. Each Unit Telescope is a Ritchey-Chretien Cassegrain telescope with a 22-tonne 8.2 metre Zerodur primary mirror of 14.4 m focal length, and

AMBER (Very Large Telescope) - Misplaced Pages Continue

1568-519: The four smaller 1.8-metre ATs are available and dedicated to interferometry to allow the VLTI to operate every night. The top part of each AT is a round enclosure, made from two sets of three segments, which open and close. Its job is to protect the delicate 1.8-metre telescope from the desert conditions. The enclosure is supported by the boxy transporter section, which also contains electronics cabinets, liquid cooling systems, air-conditioning units, power supplies, and more. During astronomical observations

1617-509: The inner structure of the mysterious Eta Carinae . In March 2011, the PIONIER instrument for the first time simultaneously combined the light of the four Unit Telescopes, potentially making VLTI the biggest optical telescope in the world. However, this attempt was not really a success. The first successful attempt was in February 2012, with four telescopes combined into a 130-meter diameter mirror. In March 2019, ESO astronomers, employing

1666-515: The intense gravity close to the central black hole. Using the VLT, astronomers have also estimated the age of extremely old stars in the NGC 6397 cluster. Based on stellar evolution models, two stars were found to be 13.4 ± 0.8 billion years old, that is, they are from the earliest era of star formation in the Universe. They have also analysed the atmosphere around a super-Earth exoplanet for

1715-400: The light via tunnels to the central VLTI beam-combiners. The maximum field-of-view (at Nasmyth foci) is around 27 arcminutes diameter, slightly smaller than the full moon, though most instruments view a narrower field. Each telescope has an alt-azimuth mount with total mass around 350 tonnes, and uses active optics with 150 supports on the back of the primary mirror to control the shape of

1764-418: The main delay line, beam compressor and feeding optics. Additionally, the interferometric technique is such that it is very efficient only for objects that are small enough that all their light is concentrated. For instance, an object with a relatively low surface brightness such as the moon cannot be observed, because its light is too diluted. Only targets which are at temperatures of more than 1,000° C have

1813-485: The needs of the observing project. The reconfigurable nature of the VLTI is similar to that of the Very Large Array . Results from the VLT have led to the publication of an average of more than one peer-reviewed scientific paper per day. For instance in 2017, over 600 refereed scientific papers were published based on VLT data. The telescope's scientific discoveries include direct imaging of Beta Pictoris b ,

1862-416: The performance of the main delay lines . Note that this only applies to the interferometer and not other instruments on Paranal. In 2005, the VLTI was routinely producing observations, although with a brighter limiting magnitude and poorer observing efficiency than expected. As of March 2008 , the VLTI had already led to the publication of 89 peer-reviewed publications and had published a first-ever image of

1911-541: The pioneering observations made using the VLT include the first direct image of an exoplanet , the tracking of stars orbiting around the supermassive black hole at the centre of the Milky Way , and observations of the afterglow of the furthest known gamma-ray burst . The VLT consists of an arrangement of four large (8.2 metre diameter) telescopes (called Unit Telescopes or UTs) with optical elements that can combine them into an astronomical interferometer (VLTI), which

1960-511: The scientific objectives of CRIRES+ is in-transit spectroscopy of exoplanets, which currently provides us with the only means of studying exoplanetary atmospheres. Transiting planets are almost always close-in planets that are hot and radiate most of their light in the infrared (IR) . Furthermore, the IR is a spectral region where lines of molecular gases like carbon monoxide (CO) , ammonia (NH 3 ) , and methane (CH 4 ) , etc. are expected from

2009-411: The telescope. (The central hole in the primary mirror may still host a Cassegrain focus if the tertiary can be moved out of the way.) This flat mirror is placed on the altitude axis, so that the beam exits through a hole in the middle of the altitude bearing. This means the eyepiece or instrument does not need to move up and down with the telescope as the tertiary mirror's angle with the main telescope axis

AMBER (Very Large Telescope) - Misplaced Pages Continue

2058-432: The temperature and wind flow. The principal role of the main VLT telescopes is to operate as four independent telescopes. The interferometry (combining light from multiple telescopes) is used about 20 percent of the time for very high-resolution on bright objects, for example, on Betelgeuse . This mode allows astronomers to see details up to 25 times finer than with the individual telescopes. The light beams are combined in

2107-485: The thin (177mm thick) mirror by computers. The VLT instrumentation programme is the most ambitious programme ever conceived for a single observatory. It includes large-field imagers, adaptive optics corrected cameras and spectrographs, as well as high-resolution and multi-object spectrographs and covers a broad spectral region, from deep ultraviolet (300 nm) to mid-infrared (24 μm) wavelengths. In addition to these, GRAVITY and MATISSE are currently installed in

2156-523: The time of the Paranal inauguration, four meaningful names of objects in the sky in the Mapuche language were chosen. This indigenous people lives mostly south of Santiago de Chile. An essay contest was arranged in this connection among schoolchildren of the Chilean II Region of which Antofagasta is the capital to write about the implications of these names. It drew many entries dealing with

2205-522: The usable diameter to 8.0 meters at the Nasmyth focus and 8.1 meters at the Cassegrain focus . The 8.2 m-diameter telescopes are housed in compact, thermally controlled buildings, which rotate synchronously with the telescopes. This design minimises any adverse effects on the observing conditions, for instance from air turbulence in the telescope tube, which might otherwise occur due to variations in

2254-484: The use of large telescope diameters and adaptive optics correction can improve the sensitivity, this cannot extend the reach of optical interferometry beyond nearby stars and the brightest active galactic nuclei . Because the Unit Telescopes are used most of the time independently, they are used in the interferometric mode mostly during bright time (that is, close to full moon). At other times, interferometry

2303-428: Was initially designed to perform coherent integration (which requires signal-to-noise greater than one in each atmospheric coherence time). Using the big telescopes and coherent integration, the faintest object the VLTI can observe is magnitude 7 in the near infrared for broadband observations, similar to many other near infrared / optical interferometers without fringe tracking. In 2011, an incoherent integration mode

2352-506: Was introduced called AMBER "blind mode", which is more similar to the observation mode used at earlier interferometer arrays such as COAST, IOTA and CHARA. In this "blind mode", AMBER can observe sources as faint as K=10 in medium spectral resolution. At more challenging mid-infrared wavelengths, the VLTI can reach magnitude 4.5, significantly fainter than the Infrared Spatial Interferometer . When fringe tracking

2401-421: Was some confusion as to whether Yepun actually stands for the evening star Venus, because a Spanish-Mapuche dictionary from the 1940s wrongly translated Yepun as "Sirius". Although the four 8.2-metre Unit Telescopes can be combined in the VLTI , their observation time is spent mostly on individual observations, and are used for interferometric observations for a limited number of nights every year. However,

#215784