Linkage Infrastructure, Equipment And Facilities - Grant ID: LE100100164
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$500,000.00
Summary
GNOSIS: a new window on the early universe using revolutionary photonic technology. Australian astronomers have a long history in innovative instrumentation and are some of the early pioneers in infrared astronomy. The GNOSIS project brings together leading Australian astronomers to build on past success. This facility instrument makes use of recent technological advances in photonics—a key strength of Australian research and industry—to provide a dramatic improvement in observational sensitivit ....GNOSIS: a new window on the early universe using revolutionary photonic technology. Australian astronomers have a long history in innovative instrumentation and are some of the early pioneers in infrared astronomy. The GNOSIS project brings together leading Australian astronomers to build on past success. This facility instrument makes use of recent technological advances in photonics—a key strength of Australian research and industry—to provide a dramatic improvement in observational sensitivity at these wavelengths. This will allow Australian astronomers to carry out new science programmes that have not been possible to date. These programmes include unprecedented observations of very cool low mass stars, the first chemical information on dust-embedded star clusters, and accurate ages for distant galaxies.Read moreRead less
Linkage Infrastructure, Equipment And Facilities - Grant ID: LE140100013
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$300,000.00
Summary
A sensitive tip-tilt wave-front sensor for the multi-conjugate adaptive-optics system on the Gemini south telescope. A sensitive tip-tilt wavefront sensor for the multi-conjugate adaptive-optics system on the Gemini South telescope: This project will construct a sensitive tip-tilt wavefront sensor for GeMS, the multi-conjugate adaptive-optics system on the Gemini South telescope in Chile. GeMS is a unique and revolutionary new system that delivers near-infrared images at similar resolution to th ....A sensitive tip-tilt wave-front sensor for the multi-conjugate adaptive-optics system on the Gemini south telescope. A sensitive tip-tilt wavefront sensor for the multi-conjugate adaptive-optics system on the Gemini South telescope: This project will construct a sensitive tip-tilt wavefront sensor for GeMS, the multi-conjugate adaptive-optics system on the Gemini South telescope in Chile. GeMS is a unique and revolutionary new system that delivers near-infrared images at similar resolution to the Hubble Space Telescope at optical wavelengths over wide fields. With this improvement in technology it will be possible to do this on much fainter objects than is currently possible using this new wave-front sensor. This will allow GeMS to routinely study the morphologies of external galaxies at high angular resolution - greatly extending its science scope. Sharper images will also be obtained for all objects that are currently accessible, leading to higher quality science data.Read moreRead less
Linkage Infrastructure, Equipment And Facilities - Grant ID: LE200100201
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$530,000.00
Summary
A major upgrade to the Australia Telescope Compact Array. This project aims to upgrade the $150m CSIRO Australia Telescope Compact Array ("the telescope"), by replacing the signal processing electronics and doubling the bandwidth. This will significantly enhance the performance of the telescope, enabling more ambitious science by the 450 researchers and students who use it each year. For example, it will enable the telescope to study radio counterparts to Gravitational Wave sources, and it will ....A major upgrade to the Australia Telescope Compact Array. This project aims to upgrade the $150m CSIRO Australia Telescope Compact Array ("the telescope"), by replacing the signal processing electronics and doubling the bandwidth. This will significantly enhance the performance of the telescope, enabling more ambitious science by the 450 researchers and students who use it each year. For example, it will enable the telescope to study radio counterparts to Gravitational Wave sources, and it will enable it to make detailed observations of initial discoveries made with the Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder and other Australian telescopes. In short, it will enable Australian researchers to do more ambitious research, and make more discoveries, across broad areas of astrophysics.Read moreRead less
Linkage Infrastructure, Equipment And Facilities - Grant ID: LE0236657
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$210,000.00
Summary
Renewed Great Melbourne Telescope: Opening a Window on the Universe. We propose to refurbish the Great Melbourne Telescope (GMT) located at Mount Stromlo Observatory with a new state-of-the-art imager. This instrument will be available to the entire Australian Astronomical community, and will allow Australian researchers to undertake cutting edge research with this world leading two colour wide field imager. A fully automated observing and data reduction pipeline, a world first for a telescope o ....Renewed Great Melbourne Telescope: Opening a Window on the Universe. We propose to refurbish the Great Melbourne Telescope (GMT) located at Mount Stromlo Observatory with a new state-of-the-art imager. This instrument will be available to the entire Australian Astronomical community, and will allow Australian researchers to undertake cutting edge research with this world leading two colour wide field imager. A fully automated observing and data reduction pipeline, a world first for a telescope of this size, means astronomers can work on their data, analyzing everything from the Solar System, to the most distant objects in the Universe, rather than spending night after night at the telescope.Read moreRead less
Peering through the Dark Ages with the Murchison Widefield Array. There is one large gap in our understanding of the early evolution of the universe, namely, when did the first sources of light appear? Resolution of this puzzle requires new observational and technical strategies, both in terms of telescopes and the analysis of observations. The Murchison Widefield Array, a major new radio telescope in Western Australia, is an international initiative under construction to tackle the problem. Thi ....Peering through the Dark Ages with the Murchison Widefield Array. There is one large gap in our understanding of the early evolution of the universe, namely, when did the first sources of light appear? Resolution of this puzzle requires new observational and technical strategies, both in terms of telescopes and the analysis of observations. The Murchison Widefield Array, a major new radio telescope in Western Australia, is an international initiative under construction to tackle the problem. This program will provide a significant Australian contribution at the forefront of modern cosmology.Read moreRead less
The morphological evolution of galaxies over cosmic time. Present-day galaxies look either red and round or blue and disc-like; this project will study galaxies that existed when the universe was one quarter its present age to understand how these different structures came about. To do this, the project will use a new high resolution near-infrared camera built at The Australian National University.
Linkage Infrastructure, Equipment And Facilities - Grant ID: LE160100031
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$1,000,000.00
Summary
Expanding our view of the Universe with the Murchison Widefield Array. Expanding our view of the Universe with the Murchison Widefield Array:
This project aims to build a Phase 2 Murchison Widefield Array (MWA) to boost the capabilities of the Phase 1 MWA by an order of magnitude. The Epoch of Reionisation (EoR), when the first stars and galaxies lit up the universe, is the last unstudied phase of cosmic evolution. The MWA is at the frontier of EoR research and all-sky survey astrophysics, is t ....Expanding our view of the Universe with the Murchison Widefield Array. Expanding our view of the Universe with the Murchison Widefield Array:
This project aims to build a Phase 2 Murchison Widefield Array (MWA) to boost the capabilities of the Phase 1 MWA by an order of magnitude. The Epoch of Reionisation (EoR), when the first stars and galaxies lit up the universe, is the last unstudied phase of cosmic evolution. The MWA is at the frontier of EoR research and all-sky survey astrophysics, is the only low frequency precursor for the Square Kilometre Array (SKA), and is the only SKA precursor delivering science quality data. This project to construct a Phase 2 MWA would double the number of antennas in the array, double the maximum baseline length, and boost our all-sky survey and EoR capabilities. Read moreRead less
Linkage Infrastructure, Equipment And Facilities - Grant ID: LE160100014
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$550,000.00
Summary
VeloceCal: Hyper-Calibrating Australia's Planet Foundry. VeloceCal: hyper-calibrating Australia's planet foundry:
VeloceCal aims to deliver a hyper-calibration capability to Australia's premier high-resolution optical spectrograph, such that instrumental drifts will make an insignificant contribution to the system's Doppler velocity measurement capabilities. This would transform Australian capabilities for the measurement of masses (and so densities) for the lowest mass planets which will be em ....VeloceCal: Hyper-Calibrating Australia's Planet Foundry. VeloceCal: hyper-calibrating Australia's planet foundry:
VeloceCal aims to deliver a hyper-calibration capability to Australia's premier high-resolution optical spectrograph, such that instrumental drifts will make an insignificant contribution to the system's Doppler velocity measurement capabilities. This would transform Australian capabilities for the measurement of masses (and so densities) for the lowest mass planets which will be emerging from NASA's next-generation Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) from 2017 onwards. VeloceCal would play a pivotal role in determining whether the smallest planets found by TESS are terrestrial (like the Earth) or icy (like Neptune), and in unambiguously discovering terrestrial planets orbiting low-mass stars in habitable orbits.Read moreRead less