A group of scientists from the University of British Columbia came to the conclusion that the highest area of the Antarctic plateau It is the area of the world where the best clear night view exists to register the stars from Earth.
According to research published in the journalNature, if a telescope is located in the area that is one of the coldest and most remote places on Earth could out-vision any other site astronomical planet.
“The combination of high altitude, low temperature, long periods of continuous darkness, and an exceptionally stable atmosphere makes Dome A a very attractive place for optical and infrared astronomy. A telescope located there would have sharper images and could detect fainter objects, “explained astronomer Paul Hickson, a co-author of the study.
Dome A is on an extensive plateau, flat for hundreds of kilometers in all directions so local winds create very little turbulence. (????Xiaoping Pang and Shiyun Wang) pic.twitter.com/7FOya7wJJc
One of the biggest challenges in terrestrial astronomy is overcoming the effect of atmospheric turbulence on the image quality of the telescope. This image noise that stars make when they blink and their impact is measured is known as “seeing”: the less turbulence the better.
“The thinner boundary layer on Dome A makes it less difficult to position a telescope on it, which provides greater access to the free atmosphere“, said the astronomer Bin Ma, another of the authors of the article.
Currently, the highest performance observatories are located at high altitude locations along the equator and offer views in the range of 0.6 to 0.8 arc seconds. In general, Antarctica has the potential to see better, due to weaker turbulence in the free atmosphere, with an estimated range of 0.23 to 0.36 arc seconds in a place called Domo C.
The Antarctic plateau, from which better images of the stars can be recorded. (Photo: Astrophysicist Zhaohui Shang)
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The scientists evaluated a different location, Dome A, also known as the Argus Dome. Dome A is located near the center of East Antarctica, about 1200 kilometers inland.
The study arrived at the estimate that the measurements of Dome A, taken at a height of eight meters, they were much better than those of the same height in Dome C and comparable to those of a height of 20 meters in Dome C.
Unsurprisingly, the researchers’ team’s visualization capabilities also were hampered by frost: Overcoming this problem could improve vision by 10 to 12 percent. “Our telescope observed the sky fully automatically at an unmanned station in Antarctica for seven months, with the air temperature dropping to -75 centigrade at times. In itself, that is a technological advance,” Ma closed.
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