Prototype Schwarzschild-Couder Telescope for the Cherenkov Telescope Array: Commissioning Status of the Optical System
- Award ID(s):
- 1707945
- PAR ID:
- 10173213
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- ICRC 2019
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
More Like this
-
The Schwarzschild-Couder Telescope (SCT) is a mid-size telescope proposed for the Cherenkov Telescope Array. In order to substantially improve the eld of view and image resolution compared to i traditional Davies-Cotton telescopes, innovative solutions are foreseen in the design, like the use of Silicon Photomultipliers (SiPM) as light sensors and waveform digitizers for recording the fast light signals from atmospheric showers. A project is now underway to upgrade the camera by increasing its pixel count to 11; 328 pixels and field of view of 8:0. The camera electronics has been completely redesigned by using new waveform digitizer and trigger ASICs with the final goal of lowering the gamma-ray energy threshold and therefore provide an excellent instrument tailored for extended sources investigations and multi-messenger astronomy.more » « less
-
Marshall, Heather K.; Spyromilio, Jason; Usuda, Tomonori (Ed.)
-
Abstract The main science aim of the BlackGEM array is to detect optical counterparts to gravitational wave mergers. Additionally, the array will perform a set of synoptic surveys to detect Local Universe transients and short timescale variability in stars and binaries, as well as a six-filter all-sky survey down to ∼22nd mag. The BlackGEM Phase-I array consists of three optical wide-field unit telescopes. Each unit uses anf/5.5 modified Dall-Kirkham (Harmer-Wynne) design with a triplet corrector lens, and a 65 cm primary mirror, coupled with a 110Mpix CCD detector, that provides an instantaneous field-of-view of 2.7 square degrees, sampled at 0.″564 pixel−1. The total field-of-view for the array is 8.2 square degrees. Each telescope is equipped with a six-slot filter wheel containing an optimised Sloan set (BG-u, BG-g, BG-r, BG-i, BG-z) and a wider-band 440–720 nm (BG-q) filter. Each unit telescope is independent from the others. Cloud-based data processing is done in real time, and includes a transient-detection routine as well as a full-source optimal-photometry module. BlackGEM has been installed at the ESO La Silla observatory as of 2019 October. After a prolonged COVID-19 hiatus, science operations started on 2023 April 1 and will run for five years. Aside from its core scientific program, BlackGEM will give rise to a multitude of additional science cases in multi-colour time-domain astronomy, to the benefit of a variety of topics in astrophysics, such as infant supernovae, luminous red novae, asteroseismology of post-main-sequence objects, (ultracompact) binary stars, and the relation between gravitational wave counterparts and other classes of transients.more » « less
An official website of the United States government

