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M. L. Cobb (New Mexico Tech and Southeast Missouri State University)
The Magdalena Ridge Observatory (MRO) has recently completed its Preliminary Design Review (PDR). The project consists of two sub projects: a 10 element optical interferometer and a rapid response 2.4 m stand alone telescope. This poster will give a brief overview of the preliminary design plans for both sub projects.
The MRO interferometer will consist of 10, 1.5 m telescopes arraigned in a classical "Y" configuration. Unique properties are the inclusion of Adaptive Optics (AO) in the design and a novel telescope mount configuration which manages the polarization vector of the light through the optical system to the combining table. The array is designed to be reconfigurable in a weeks time frame which will be performed around 6 month configuration seasons and has a maximum baseline of 400m.
The MRO rapid response telescope is designed around a government surplus 2.4 m mirror with an active control system to allow fast slew and settling times to quickly respond to transit phenomena. A primary use will be observations of solar system objects including asteroids. Initial instruments will include simple imaging capability with plans to build a low resolution spectrometer as well as an imaging spectropolarimeter.
If you would like more information about this abstract, please follow the link to http://www.mro.nmt.edu. This link was provided by the author. When you follow it, you will leave the Web site for this meeting; to return, you should use the Back comand on your browser.
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Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, 34, #4
© 2002. The American Astronomical Soceity.