Last December, two workshops led by the AtLAST sustainability team served as a forum to discuss relevant topics for the astronomical community: a path toward sustainable telescope operations.
On October 10th to 12th, we held the fourth AtLAST consortium meeting at ESO headquarters in Garching, Germany, using a hybrid format. We had a record attendance, with about 25 consortium members joining in person, and about 20 more on Zoom. Exciting progress has been made in all the different work packages, as we now approach the end of the design study phase.
The AtLAST consortium releases a sensitivity calculator that allows astronomers to determine the integration time needed for an observation to be precise enough to test a particular scientific theory, demonstrating what AtLAST will be able to do for their science.
A new status update on the design of the antenna was presented on August 23, 2023, at the URSI GASS 2023 conference in Sapporo, Japan, by Patricio Gallardo, a fellow at the University of Chicago’s Kavli Institute for Cosmological Physics (KICP), on behalf of the AtLAST team.
Over the summer, the Department of Technology Systems (ITS) at the University of Oslo warmly welcomed three students to work on topics related to the AtLAST project.
How windy does it get on the Chajnantor Plateau in the Chilean Andes? The AtLAST-team has installed a high-tech, weather tower for measuring the wind speed on the prospective AtLAST sites.
On October 5 and 6 we held our annual consortium meeting, the first one using a hybrid format, with two thirds of the team meeting in person at the University of Oslo, and the rest joining online. The importance of synergy and feedback from all the different work packages was the highlight of the event.
In June our energy team went for their first field trip to Atacama del Chile, 5000 m above sea level, a notorious paradise for astronomers. The team ran workshops and discussed with engineers on site about renewable energy solutions.
July 5th was a crucial day for the AtLAST project: several months of planning and organization culminated in a workshop on sustainable energy communities in San Pedro de Atacama.
Designed and implemented by Luca Di Mascolo, the new logo shows more realistic features of the antenna’s structural design as well as hints at the ideal location for the world's largest sub-millimetre astronomical telescope.
In June 2022, the University of Oslo, on behalf of the AtLAST consortium, and the Max Planck Institute for Radio Astronomy (MPIfR), signed a cooperation agreement to facilitate and promote the scientific and technical collaboration between the AtLAST design study and the APEX telescope projects.
In December 2021, two of our Europe-based AtLAST team members traveled to Chile and started the local activities for the site selection and sustainable energy work. Where should we place the new 50-meter dish?
An innovative antenna design, a large science community engagement, snow and volcanos, practical challenges of remote observations, a weather resilient renewable energy system, and a roadmap for the future.
Early in October, AtLAST project coordinator Claudia Cicone (UiO) and Work Package 2 (Telescope Design) leader Tony Mroczkowski (ESO) met in Mainz with the professional team from OHB Digital Connect (ex MT Mechatronics) working on the design of AtLAST.
Last week the Department of Technology Systems and the Institute of Theoretical Astrophysics had the pleasure of hosting a two days visit from Carlos De Breuck, a collaborator from the EU project AtLAST.
March 2021 marks the start of the study design for a new, revolutionary, low carbon footprint sub-millimetre telescope.
The EU-funded design study of the world's largest sub-millimetre astronomical telescope is about to start. The work, led by the University of Oslo, includes a study to power the telescope by renewable energy.
"The favourite part of my job is the collection, reduction and analysis of observational data. I particularly enjoy the process of “cleaning” and exploring the data to reveal their hidden information."
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