Science at ESO Mark Casali
La Silla Paranal ALMA
Visual/infrared light La Silla telescopes incl. 3.6m and NTT VLT, VLTI, VISTA and VST on Paranal E-ELT construction on Armazones Instrumentation development Submillimeter radio waves APEX & ALMA partnerships at Chajnantor High-quality user support ESO s Programme 3
La Silla - ESOs first observatory
GL581 Result from the HARPS precision spectrometer Three orbiting planets One is in the habitable zone Temperature of 0 40 C
Paranal Observatory
Very Large Telescope (VLT)
Very Large Telescope (VLT) 4 x 8.2m telescopes 4 x 1.8m ATs (interferometry) VST (2.6m visible survey telescope) VISTA (4.1 m infrared survey telescope)
Laser for artificial stars
Instrumentation Programme Long-range plan Upgrades and new instruments in budget through 2030 + In-house development programme Detectors, controllers Adaptive optics systems Innovative fiber lasers (patented) Infrastructure upgrades Adaptive Optics Facility on UT4 in 2015/16 Four powerful lasers plus deformable secondary Key components for VLTI NAOMI: Adaptive Optics units for ATs Commissioning of incoherent combined focus allowing ESPRESSO to use 4 UTs 16
Partnership with Community Future Paranal instruments VLT: ESPRESSO, CRIRES +, CUBES, ERIS, MOONS, VLTI: GRAVITY, MATISSE, VISTA: 4MOST Most instruments built by consortia of institutes ESO pays hardware (~1/3 rd of total cost) Consortia provide staff effort at own cost compensated in Guaranteed Time Well funded programmes 4-5M per year for VLT instrumentation ELT first 3 instruments + AO systems approx. 60M 17
VLT Interferometry
VISTA for wide angle surveys
Seeing the heart of our Galaxy
Using ESO instruments we can see the region surrounding the 2 million solar mass Black Hole at the heart of our galaxy, even though this is over 25,000 light-years away, and observe the orbits of these stars in exquisite detail
The Chajnantor Plateau 5000 m
APEX
APEX Atacama Pathfinder Experiment (since 2006) 12m sub-millimeter antenna at 5100m on Chajnantor Partnership of MPIfR (50%), OSO (23%) and ESO (27%) Agreed through 2017, consider extension after review in 2015 Operated by ESO @ Sequitor since 2007 Instrumentation Facility, PI- and visiting bolometers and spectrometers Kilo-pixel cameras A-MKIDS and ArTeMiS commissioned 28
Atacama Large Millimeter/sub-millimeter Array
ALMA International Project Europe (ESO) North America (USA, Canada) East Asia (Japan, Taiwan, South Korea) 66 Antennas combine to provide high angular resolution Position of antennas is configurable
ALMA Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array 54 x 12m + 12 x 7m antenna s on Chajnantor at 5050m 7 0.35 mm (30-900 GHz) in 10 + atmospheric windows World s most powerful radio interferometer Cold Universe: formation of planets, stars and galaxies Construction essentially completed All equipment procured by Partners ESO contribution corresponds to ~485 MEUR Transition to full operations will take few more years Transformational facility Superb Chajnantor site, state-of-the art receivers 66 antennas and baselines larger than 15 km 31
Overview of ALMA
Transporting one of the 100 tonne radio telescopes
ALMA image HL Tau HST image of young star regions The ALMA instrument can probe through the dust and gas surrounding young stars and image regions which have been cleared of dust and gas by orbiting planets. The resolution of the image is finer than the normal resolution of HST.
HL Tau Protoplanetary disc Gaps indicate regions where larger bodies have swept up loose material
Interest from the community (demand) There is continuing growth in those using ESO facilities 1977 2014
Pressure = (REQ-GTO)/AVA 7.0 6.0 Available time (supply) 5.0 4.0 3.0 2.0 1.0 0.0 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 3.6m 4.5 3.8 3.0 2.3 2.1 2.1 1.7 2.0 2.0 2.2 2.1 7.0 6.0 6.1 3.0 3.1 2.2 2.4 1.5 3.1 2.0 2.1 2.5 5.1 4.0 5.8 5.2 8.0 6.4 NTT 3.6 4.9 3.2 2.9 3.2 3.2 2.5 2.4 2.6 2.6 2.5 2.8 2.3 2.0 2.0 2.3 2.3 2.5 2.4 2.9 2.8 2.7 3.1 2.4 2.4 3.2 3.5 4.1 4.8 UT1 5.5 4.4 3.3 3.2 2.6 3.7 2.1 4.0 2.6 4.3 3.1 4.0 3.3 5.2 3.6 5.2 3.8 5.2 3.7 6.7 5.8 4.9 3.0 3.9 3.0 4.1 4.3 UT2 2.8 3.5 3.9 5.0 2.7 3.9 4.4 4.0 3.4 5.1 4.1 3.8 3.4 5.1 2.8 3.9 2.8 4.3 2.9 8.5 4.2 6.9 4.9 6.5 4.1 UT3 2.0 4.5 2.1 2.7 3.5 4.5 2.1 3.3 2.9 2.0 1.5 2.5 1.8 2.8 1.9 2.2 2.2 3.6 2.4 UT4 4.7 4.5 4.3 4.0 5.7 2.9 3.8 3.8 3.0 4.4 3.9 5.1 3.4 5.0 4.3 4.1 3.0 4.2 3.1 4.0 3.8 1998 2014 Pressure factor indicates demand for particular instruments variations occur when new instruments come on-line, but older instruments continue to be popular (typically over-subscribed by a factor of ~3)
Number of papers per year Scientific papers per year (output) 900 800 700 600 500 400 300 200 100 0 VLT / VLTI La Silla Survey tel. Chajnantor Total
Comparative output
Conclusion Largest ground-based programme in the world Steady growth for many years Critical components are well-funded Instrumentation Operations Data processing and distribution to the community Vigorous outreach programme in Europe 41
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