Submillimeter Site Testing at Dome C, Antarctica

Paolo G. Calisse, Michael C. B. Ashley, Michael G. Burton, Michael A. Phillips, John W. V. Storey, Simon J. E. Radford and Jeffrey B. Peterson

Abstract

We have developed a 350 μm radiometer to perform automated site testing in remote regions of Antarctica. In summer 2000–2001 the instrument operated at Concordia, a new station under construction at Dome C on the Antarctic Plateau. We present the results, and compare them with the atmospheric opacity measured at the South Pole in the same five-week period. During these five weeks, observing conditions at Dome C were, on average, substantially better than those at the South Pole.

Keywords: atmospheric effects — instrumentation: miscellaneous — site testing — submillimeter

Publications of the Astronomical Society of Australia 21(3) 256 - 263  doi:10.1071/AS03018