Future of Astronomy

Astronomy 315Professor Lee

CarknerLecture 25

Yerkes Observatory

1897

The Future of Astronomy

What would we like to understand better? Formation of initial galaxies

Properties and numbers of extrasolar planets

Formation and evolution of black holes

Problems and Solutions

We want to study fainter objects

We want better detail

We want to study a broad range of astrophysical phenomena Use multiwavelength telescopes

Key Initiatives

While much science is done with small and common instruments, there are several large and expensive new projects that we hope will lead to big breakthroughs

Three of these are: A Giant Segmented Mirror Telescope

Webb Space Telescope

See earliest galaxies

View protoplanetary disks View planets

To be launched in June 2014 Cost: 4.5 billion dollars

Webb Format

Want to be both high performance and “cheap”

Telescope needs to be cool and so is deployed away from Earth with a large sun shield

To get large mirror to fit in small launch

vehicle, mirror folds up

International X-ray Observatory

Joint venture of NASA, ESA, and JAXA

Would have collecting area ~10 times larger than current X-ray telescopes

Would be able to get high resolution X-ray spectra of: Black hole accretion disks Hot interstellar X-ray gas

Launch: 2020?

Telescope Properties The light gathering power of a telescope depends on its

areaArea = r2

The resolution of a telescope depends on its diameter (d) and the wavelength () of light observed

R = (1.22 ) / d Determines how close two objects can be and still be resolved

(smaller R is better)

Future Ground Based Telescopes

Larger size means spectroscopy and imaging of fainter objects

Extremely Large Telescopes

Current Plans

California universities are building the Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT)

The ESO has plans for the European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT) of 42 meters

Each will cost about 1 billion dollars

Extremely Large Telescopes

Success of large telescopes depends on adaptive optics

ELT’s would complement space telescopes For follow up observations that require greater

sensitivity

HobbyEberly

Telescope1997

Telescope Trends

21st century astronomy versus 20th century astronomy: Information technology integral

Next Time

Meet in planetarium No homework or downloads