LIGHT
BUCKET ASTRONOMY CONFERENCE
Technology Development and Research Programs
International Conference December 31 (2010) – January 2
(2011)
Pre-conference tours: Mona Loa & Mona Kea - December 29
& 30, 2010
Post-conference tour: Volcanoes National Park - January
3, 2011
Canada France Hawaii Observatory Headquarters
Waimea (near Kona), the Big Island of Hawaii
Conference Organizers
Co-chairs:
Russell Genet, California Polytechnic State University,
RussMGenet@aol.com
Bruce Holenstein, Gravic, Inc.,
BHolenstein@Gravic.com
Local Host: Josh Walawender, University of Hawaii,
JoshW@IFA.Hawaii.edu
Coordinator: Jolyon Johnson, California State
University, Chico
JolyonJohnson@GMail.com
Website
www.AltAzInitiative.org
Introduction
This conference
will be held in Waimea on the Big Island of Hawaii at
the headquarters of the Canada France Hawaii Telescope.
The goals of the conference are two fold. First, to
describe the scientific research programs that would
most benefit from telescopes which are so low in cost
(both construction and operation) that entire telescopes
or even arrays of telescopes can be dedicated to
specific research programs. Second, to explore how new
technologies can be applied to developing lightweight,
low cost, 1-3 meter “light bucket” telescopes and their
instrumentation.
Jacquelyn Mitton, in the
Cambridge Dictionary of Astronomy (2001), defines
a light bucket as “A colloquial
expression for a flux collector.” She defines a
flux collector, in turn, as “A telescope
designed solely to collect radiation in order to measure
its intensity or to carry out spectral analysis,”
mentioning that, “No attempt is made to form an image so
a flux collector can have a more crudely figured
reflective surface than a conventional telescope.” We
have extended Mitton’s light bucket definition to
include photometric CCD “imaging” with low quality, low
cost optics (typically several waves as opposed to
quarter wave or better optics).
Light bucket telescopes
excel in comparison with smaller aperture more expensive
diffraction-limited telescopes when the sky background
is a small or nearly negligible source of noise. This
situation can occur when: (1) the object being observed
is very bright, (2) the integration times
are very short
and hence photon arrival noise becomes important,
(3)
scintillation noise becomes a dominant noise source, (4)
the bandwidth is very narrow or the light is spread out
as in spectroscopy resulting in significant photon
arrival noise, or (5) noise from the detector is
dominant, as it can be in the near infrared. Although
the conference emphasis will be on midsized-aperture
(1.0- to 3.0-m), relatively low-cost, lightweight (often
transportable), flux collector telescopes, much larger
light bucket telescopes, such as Cherenkov radiation
telescopes, will also be discussed.
Science programs well
suited for light bucket astronomy include: many high
speed phenomena, including lunar and asteroid
occultations; fast cadence, high precision CCD
photometry; near infrared diaphragm-limiting or area
photometry; low to medium resolution spectroscopy; and
polarimetry. Finally, we note that an array of a
half-dozen light bucket telescopes equipped with very
high speed photometers could, with their many
two-telescope combinations, provide images of the
surfaces of nearby stars via intensity interferometry—a
quantum-mechanical effect that occurs at sub-nanosecond
timescales. Such an array would be a modern extension
of Hanbury Brown’s pioneering research, decades ago,
with his two-telescope interferometer in Narrabri,
Australia.
Conference Specifics
Invited
PowerPoint talks will be 20 minutes in length.
Alternatively, all attendees are welcome to display a
poster for the entire conference.
Mid-morning
breaks will be set aside for poster discussions. Written
versions of selected talks from the conference will be
combined with other contributions to the book Light
Bucket Astronomy, which will be published by the
Collins Foundation Press.
Pre-conference tours are
being arranged for
Mauna Loa Observatory
(on Wednesday
December 29) and
Mauna Kea Observatories on Thursday
December 30. Post conference tour to
Volcanoes
National Park will be arranged
if there is sufficient interest. Accompanying guests will be welcome on the tours and
evening functions.
All attendees need to register. The modest registration
fee covers miscellaneous conference expenses and morning
refreshments. Local
accommodations
are reasonably
priced. The Big Island of Hawaii is ideal for a
family
vacation.
Click
here for special information for astronomer's
visiting the Big Island
For additional Information please
see:
AltAz Initiative -
http://www.AltAzInitiative.org
Canada France Hawaii Telescope -
http://www.cfht.hawaii.edu
NASA Infrared Telescope Facility -
http://irtfweb.ifa.hawaii.edu
Gemini Telescope -
http://www.gemini.edu
Mauna Kea Visitor Information Station -
http://www.ifa.hawaii.edu/info/vis/
Mauna Loa Observatory -
http://www.mlo.noaa.gov
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