The development of the Schmidt telescope

Bernhard Schmidt (1879–1935) was born in Estonia. After a few years of studying engineering he ran an optical workshop in Mittweida, Saxonia, between 1901 and 1927. Astronomers appreciated the quality of his telescopes. Starting in 1925, on behalf of the Hamburg Observatory, he developed a short focal length optical system with a large field of view. For this purpose, Schmidt moved his workshop to the observatory. He succeeded in inventing the “Schmidt telescope” which allows the imaging of a large field of the sky without any distortions. Schmidt's first telescope (spherical mirror diameter 0.44 m, correction plate 0.36 m diameter, aperture ratio 1:1.75, and focal length 0.625 m) has been used since 1962 at the Boyden Observatory in Bloemfontein/South Africa. Apart from his 0.36m telescope, Schmidt produced a second larger one of 0.60m aperture. Shortly after Schmidt's death, the director of the observatory published details on the invention and production of the Schmidt telescope. After World War II, Schmidt telescopes have been widely used. The first large Schmidt telescope, the “Big Schmidt” (1.26 m), Mount Palomar, USA, was completed in 1948. The 0.80 m Schmidt telescope of Hamburg Observatory, planned since 1936, finished in 1954, is now on Calar Alto/Spain (© 2009 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)     

The design of diamond Compton telescope

We have developed radiation detectors using the new synthetic diamonds. The diamond detector has an advantage for observations of “low/medium” energy gamma rays as a Compton telescope. The primary advantage of the diamond detector can reduce the photoelectric effect in the low energy range, which is background noise for tracking of the Compton recoil electron. A concept of the Diamond Compton Telescope (DCT) consists of position sensitive layers of diamond-striped detector and calorimeter layer of CdTe detector. The key part of the DCT is diamond-striped detectors with a higher positional resolution and a wider energy range from 10 keV to 10 MeV. However, the diamond-striped detector is under development. We describe the performance of prototype diamond detector and the design of a possible DCT evaluated by Monte Carlo simulations.      

紫金山天文台赣榆观测站精细结构望远镜终端系统改造及最新观测结果

为了观测太阳耀斑高速电子轰击色球,紫金山天文台赣榆观测站将原精细结构望远镜改造为高速CCD精细结构望远镜,拍摄到局部H_α活动区．在光学系统里增加缩焦器,引进干涉偏振滤光片后,高速CCD就能记录H_α各波段的单色像．经过1999年至2004年的反复试验和改进,目前H_α图像的空间分辨率己达1个角秒,时间分辨率为每秒钟30至40帧图像．2004年11月观测到一个M1．1级耀斑,我们将H_α紫移(H_α-0．5(?))高速图像和硬X-射线暴、射电微波暴比较,结果发现：初始的耀斑成对亮点在上升相相互靠近,特别是微波暴源也显出类似的靠近运动,以前从未观测到这种现象,它可解释为磁弧脚根沿中性线的剪切运动．     

New evidence of precision premium for Galilean satellites from CCD imaging

After a CCD image of the four Galilean satellites of Jupiter is obtained by a long focal length telescope, we can compare the theoretical positions of these satellites with their pixel positions so as to obtain the calibration parameters of the CCD field of view. In theory, when two of the four satellites have small enough separation, their relative positional measurement will have a good accuracy since the error existing in the solved calibration parameters has a direct proportional effect on the separation of the two satellites. The 347 CCD images taken by 1-m long focal length telescope at Yunnan Observatory in 2002-2005 are used to perform the experimental test. After we improve the centroid algorithm for the satellites and our former halo-removal technique, the results show that the positional measurement of two small-separation satellites has an external precision as good as 0.01-0.03 arcsec. This precision has comparability as that from rarely occurring mutual events of the Galilean satellites. This experiment confirms the finding of the “precision premium” firstly presented by Pascu [1994. An appraisal of the USNO program of photographic astrometry of bright planetary satellites. In: Morrison, L.V., Gilmore, G.F., (Eds.), Galatic and Solar System Optical Astrometry, pp. 304-311] using photographic observations. We believe that this type of observations, besides mutual event observations, might also be used to improve our knowledge of the orbital motions of the Galilean satellites because of its much more opportunities.     

The University of New South Wales Extrasolar Planet Search: a catalogue of variable stars from fields observed between 2004 and 2007

We present a new catalogue of variable stars compiled from the data taken for the University of New South Wales Extrasolar Planet Search. From 2004 October to 2007 May, 25 target fields were each observed for one to four months, resulting in ∼87 000 high-precision light curves with 1600–4400 data points. We have extracted a total of 850 variable light curves, 659 of which do not have a counterpart in the General Catalogue of Variable Stars, the New Suspected Variables catalogue or the All Sky Automated Survey southern variable star catalogue. The catalogue is detailed here, and includes 142 Algol-type eclipsing binaries, 23 β Lyrae-type eclipsing binaries, 218 contact eclipsing binaries, 53 RR Lyrae stars, 26 Cepheid stars, 13 rotationally variable active stars, 153 uncategorized pulsating stars with periods <10 d, including δ Scuti stars, and 222 long period variables with variability on time-scales of >10 d. As a general application of variable stars discovered by extrasolar planet transit search projects, we discuss several astrophysical problems which could benefit from carefully selected samples of bright variables. These include (i) the quest for contact binaries with the smallest mass ratio, which could be used to test theories of binary mergers; (ii) detached eclipsing binaries with pre-main-sequence components, which are important test objects for calibrating stellar evolutionary models and (iii) RR Lyrae-type pulsating stars exhibiting the Blazhko effect, which is one of the last great mysteries of pulsating star research.     

New views of Betelgeuse: multi-wavelength surface imaging and implications for models of hotspot generation

We report contemporaneous multi-wavelength interferometric imaging of the red supergiant star Betelgeuse ( α Orionis), using the Cambridge Optical Aperture Synthesis Telescope (COAST) and the William Herschel Telescope (WHT), at wavelengths of 700, 905 and 1290 nm. We find a strong variation in the apparent symmetry of the stellar brightness distribution as a function of wavelength. At 700 nm the star is highly asymmetric, and can be modelled as the superposition of three bright spots on a strongly limb-darkened disc. However, at 905 nm only a single low-contrast feature is visible and at 1290 nm the star presents a featureless symmetric disc. The change in spot contrast with wavelength is consistent with a model in which the bright spots represent unobscured areas of elevated temperature, owing perhaps to convection, on a stellar disc that itself has a different appearance, i.e. geometrical extent and limb-darkening profile, at different wavelengths. The featureless centre-to-limb brightness profile seen at 1290 nm is consistent with this model and suggests that future interferometric monitoring of the star to quantify the size changes associated with radial velocity variations should be performed at similar wavelengths in the near-infrared.     

In-flight Performance of the Advanced Camera for Surveys CCDs

The Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS), installed in the Hubble Space telescope in March 2002, will significantly extend HST's deep, survey imaging capabilities. ACS has met, or exceeded, all of its key performance specifications. In this paper we briefly review the in-flight performance of the instrument's CCD detectors and preview early ACS science observations. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

绕月探测工程CCD立体相机的实验室辐射定标

探月光学有效载荷系统含CCD立体相机与干涉成像光谱仪两台光学遥感器,CCD立体相机完成的科学目标主要是与激光高度计配合获取月球表面三维立体图像。文章主要叙述了三线阵立体相机的工作原理,定标内容、目的以及CCD裸片像元检测和整机的相对定标和绝对定标过程。