The atmospheric dispersion corrector for the Large Sky Area Multi--object Fibre Spectroscopic Telescope (LAMOST)

The Large Sky Area Multi--object Fibre Spectroscopic Telescope (LAMOST) is the largest (aperture 4 m) wide field of view (FOV) telescope and is equipped with the largest amount (4000) of optical fibres in the world. For the LAMOST North and the LAMOST South the FOV are 5 deg and 3.5 deg, the linear diameters are 1.75 m and 1.22 m, respectively. A new kind of atmospheric dispersion corrector (ADC) is put forward and designed for LAMOST. It is a segmented lens which consists of many lens--prism strips. Although it is very big, its thickness is only 12 mm. Thus the difficulty of obtaining big optical glass is avoided, and the aberration caused by the ADC is small. Moving this segmented lens along the optical axis, the different dispersions can be obtained. The effects of ADC's slits on the diffraction energy distribution and on the obstruction of light are discussed. The aberration caused by ADC is calculated and discussed. All these results are acceptable. Such an ADC could also be used for other optical fibre spectroscopic telescopes, especially those which a have very large FOV.Comment: 14 pages, 8 figures, Accepted for publication in MNRA

The First Release of the CSTAR Point Source Catalog from Dome A, Antarctica

In 2008 January the 24th Chinese expedition team successfully deployed the Chinese Small Telescope ARray (CSTAR) to DomeA, the highest point on the Antarctic plateau. CSTAR consists of four 14.5cm optical telescopes, each with a different filter (g, r, i and open) and has a 4.5degree x 4.5degree field of view (FOV). It operates robotically as part of the Plateau Observatory, PLATO, with each telescope taking an image every 30 seconds throughout the year whenever it is dark. During 2008, CSTAR #1 performed almost flawlessly, acquiring more than 0.3 million i-band images for a total integration time of 1728 hours during 158 days of observations. For each image taken under good sky conditions, more than 10,000 sources down to 16 mag could be detected. We performed aperture photometry on all the sources in the field to create the catalog described herein. Since CSTAR has a fixed pointing centered on the South Celestial Pole (Dec =-90 degree), all the sources within the FOV of CSTAR were monitored continuously for several months. The photometric catalog can be used for studying any variability in these sources, and for the discovery of transient sources such as supernovae, gamma-ray bursts and minor planets.Comment: 1 latex file and 9 figures The paper is accepted by PAS

The sky brightness and transparency in i-band at Dome A, Antarctica

The i-band observing conditions at Dome A on the Antarctic plateau have been investigated using data acquired during 2008 with the Chinese Small Telescope ARray. The sky brightness, variations in atmospheric transparency, cloud cover, and the presence of aurorae are obtained from these images. The median sky brightness of moonless clear nights is 20.5 mag arcsec^{-2} in the SDSS $i$ band at the South Celestial Pole (which includes a contribution of about 0.06 mag from diffuse Galactic light). The median over all Moon phases in the Antarctic winter is about 19.8 mag arcsec^{-2}. There were no thick clouds in 2008. We model contributions of the Sun and the Moon to the sky background to obtain the relationship between the sky brightness and transparency. Aurorae are identified by comparing the observed sky brightness to the sky brightness expected from this model. About 2% of the images are affected by relatively strong aurorae.Comment: There are 1 Latex file and 14 figures accepted by A

Chinese small telescope ARray (CSTAR) for Antarctic Dome A

8 page(s

Progress and results from the chinese small telescope ARray (CSTAR)

In 2008 January the 24th Chinese expedition team successfully deployed the Chinese Small Telescope ARray (CSTAR) to Dome A, the highest point on the Antarctic plateau. CSTAR consists of four 14.5cm optical telescopes, each with a different filter (g, r, i and open) and has a 4.5°×4.5° field of view (FOV). Based on the CSTAR data, initial statistics of astronomical observational site quality and light curves of variable objects were obtained. To reach higher photometric quality, we are continuing to work to overcome the effects of uneven cirrus cloud cirrus, optical ghosts and intra-pixel sensitivity. The snow surface stability is also tested for further astronomical observational instrument and for glaciology studies.8 page(s