scholarly journals Large Synoptic Survey Telescope: From science drivers to reference design

2008 ◽  
pp. 1-13 ◽  
Author(s):  
Z. Ivezic ◽  
T. Axelrod ◽  
W.N. Brandt ◽  
D.L. Burke ◽  
C.F. Claver ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Time Domain ◽  
Field Of View ◽  
Fast Time ◽  
Wide Field ◽  
History Of Astronomy ◽  
Baseline Design ◽  
Special Programs ◽  
Reference Design ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Universe

In the history of astronomy, major advances in our understanding of the Universe have come from dramatic improvements in our ability to accurately measure astronomical quantities. Aided by rapid progress in information technology, current sky surveys are changing the way we view and study the Universe. Next- generation surveys will maintain this revolutionary progress. We focus here on the most ambitious survey currently planned in the visible band, the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST). LSST will have unique survey capability in the faint time domain. The LSST design is driven by four main science themes: constraining dark energy and dark matter, taking an inventory of the Solar System, exploring the transient optical sky, and mapping the Milky Way. It will be a large, wide-field ground-based system designed to obtain multiple images covering the sky that is visible from Cerro Pachon in Northern Chile. The current baseline design, with an 8.4 m (6.5 m effective) primary mirror, a 9.6 deg2 field of view, and a 3,200 Megapixel camera, will allow about 10,000 square degrees of sky to be covered using pairs of 15-second exposures in two photometric bands every three nights on average. The system is designed to yield high image quality, as well as superb astrometric and photometric accuracy. The survey area will include 30,000 deg2 with ? < +34.5? , and will be imaged multiple times in six bands, ugrizy, covering the wavelength range 320-1050 nm. About 90% of the observing time will be devoted to a deep- wide-fast survey mode which will observe a 20,000 deg2 region about 1000 times in the six bands during the anticipated 10 years of operation. These data will result in databases including 10 billion galaxies and a similar number of stars, and will serve the majority of science programs. The remaining 10% of the observing time will be allocated to special programs such as Very Deep and Very Fast time domain surveys. We describe how the LSST science drivers led to these choices of system parameters.

Discovery of the Universe: An Outline of the History of Astronomy from the Origins to 1956

Physics Today ◽  
1957 ◽  
Vol 10 (10) ◽  
pp. 38-40
Author(s):  
Gérard de Vaucouleurs ◽  
C. C. Kiess
Keyword(s):  
History Of Astronomy ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Universe

Discovering the Universe. A History of Astronomy. Colin A. Ronan

Isis ◽  
1972 ◽  
Vol 63 (1) ◽  
pp. 110-110
Author(s):  
Victor E. Thoren
Keyword(s):  
History Of Astronomy ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Universe

scholarly journals 'Absurd' Rationalist Cosmology: Copernicus, Kepler, Descartes and the Religious Basis for the end to Aristotelian Dogma

2016 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 7
Author(s):  
Nicholas Smit-Keding
Keyword(s):  
Solar System ◽  
Rene Descartes ◽  
World View ◽  
Scientific Development ◽  
History Of Astronomy ◽  
Johannes Kepler ◽  
René Descartes ◽  
History Of ◽  
Nicholas Copernicus ◽  
The Universe

Current popular narratives regarding the history of astronomy espouse the narrative of scientific development arising from clashes between observed phenomena and dogmatic religious scripture. Such narratives consider the development of our understandings of the cosmos as isolated episodes in ground-breaking, world-view shifting events, led by rational, objective and secular observers. As observation of astronomical development in the early 1600s shows, however, such a narrative is false. Developments by Johannes Kepler, for instance, followed earlier efforts by Nicholas Copernicus to refine Aristotelian-based dogma with observed phenomena. Kepler's efforts specifically were not meant to challenge official Church teachings, but offer a superior system to what was than available, based around theological justifications. Popular acceptance of a heliocentric model came not from Kepler's writings, but from the philosophical teachings of Rene Descartes. Through strictly mathematical and philosophical reasoning, Descartes not only rendered the Aristotelian model baseless in society, but also provided a cosmological understanding of the universe that centred our solar system within a vast expanse of other stars. The shift than, from the Aristotelian geocentric model to the heliocentric model, came not from clashes between theology and reason, but from negotiations between theology and observed phenomena. 

scholarly journals The universe is here

2009 ◽  
Vol 5 (S260) ◽  
Author(s):  
Erika L. Antiche Garzón
Keyword(s):  
Science And Technology ◽  
History Of Astronomy ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Universe

AbstractAstronomy is a science devoted to the study of what existed, exists and will exist, from the most elemental particle to the most massive and powerful galaxy one observes. The study of the universe is not only meant to be to achieve an important understanding about it, but also in other fields of science and technology. The most important contribution from astronomy is perhaps social: it fascinates millions of people along the globe. The history of astronomy carries along the very history of humankind.

scholarly journals Systems Engineering approach for the concept design of the Crystal Eye detector

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
F. Renno ◽  
F. Barbato ◽  
G. Barbarino ◽  
D. Marzullo ◽  
R. Guida ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Gamma Rays ◽  
Systems Engineering ◽  
Field Of View ◽  
Wide Field ◽  
Concept Design ◽  
Good Spatial Resolution ◽  
Wide Field Of View ◽  
Wave Event ◽  
A New Technique ◽  
The Universe

Abstract Main targets of this activity research are the making and the optimization of new detectors by means of the Systems Engineering methods. With the observation of the gravitational wave event of August 17th, 2017 and then with those of the extragalactic neutrino of September 22nd, the Multimessenger Astrophysics era began. It is a new way of exploring the Universe, powered by globally coordinated observations of several experiments. So, new X and gamma rays’ detectors solutions are needed in order to provide competitive results in the energy range 10 keV–10 meV. Here is briefly described how the Systems Engineering can improve the development of the proposal of a new technique: The Crystal Eye, a wide field of view detector with a good spatial resolution obtained thanks to a high pixelation.

Visual Display Factors Contributing to Simulator Sickness

1987 ◽  
Vol 31 (5) ◽  
pp. 497-501 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lawrence J. Hettinger ◽  
Margaret D. Nolan ◽  
Robert S. Kennedy ◽  
Kevin S. Berbaum ◽  
Kevin P. Schnitzius ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Visual Display ◽  
Field Of View ◽  
Wide Field ◽  
Laboratory Studies ◽  
Causal Factors ◽  
Flight Simulators ◽  
History Of Research ◽  
Wide Field Of View ◽  
History Of ◽  
Self Motion

The history of research on visually-induced illusory self motion, or vection, has demonstrated that in many instances observers have experienced disturbances similar to those of motion sickness. Visual displays in flight simulators may also produce the experience of vection, and illusions of self motion are likely to become more common with the increased use of wide field-of-view presentations of realistic imagery. Many of the disturbances observed in laboratory studies of vection have also been found in simulators, and are likely to become more common. This paper presents a background to the study of visual-vestibular disturbances associated with illusory self motion in flight simulators, and an overview of current experimental efforts aimed at identifying the causal factors.

scholarly journals The Universe in Images: an Art-Historical Approach to the Plurality of Worlds

2012 ◽  
Vol 16 (1 and 2) ◽  
pp. 283-303
Author(s):  
Lucia Ayala
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Extrasolar Planets ◽  
History Of Astronomy ◽  
Modern Cosmology ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Subject ◽  
William Herschel ◽  
The Universe ◽  
Special Relevance

The idea of a plurality of worlds, consolidated in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, is one of the most inspiring and exciting chapters in the history of astronomy. Nevertheless, one crucial aspect has yet to be written. In this paper I propose to recompose the fascinating visual mosaic around the subject, in order to establish the basis for a largely forgotten iconography. It represents a key period in the evolution of the notions around the large-scale structure of the universe, one of the milestones in Early Modern cosmology. This tradition continued until the nineteenth century, when astronomers such as William Herschel still considered the existence of multiple similar inhabited systems. Today, when extrasolar planets and the cosmic web are in the forefront of the astrophysical vocabulary and its images are so popular, reflecting on the visual genealogy of this field acquires special relevance. This paper invites the reader to look at the sky through a telescope provided with art historical lenses.

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