Graduate Lecture in Observational Techniques
Synopsis:
- Introduction to astronomical facilities
- Coordinates, catalogues, time, observability
- Earth’s Atmosphere and advantages of Space
- Atmospheric Transmission and Emission
- Refraction and Seeing
- High Resolution imaging : Corrections for atmospheric phase
- Adaptive Optics & Interferometry
- Telescopes
- Detectors
- Photometry
- Spectroscopy
- Observing Proposals
Hopefully Useful References and texts
Essential sites:
- Simbad : http://simbad.u-strasbg.fr/simbad/
- NED : Nasa Extragalactic Database http://ned.ipac.caltech.edu
- NASA Space Data Center http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/astro/
- Canadian Astronomy Data centre http://www.cadc-ccda.hia-iha.nrc-cnrc.gc.ca/en/
- IRSA/IPAC Infrared Science Archive http://irsa.ipac.caltech.edu/frontpage/
- NRAO VLA Sky Survey http://www.cv.nrao.edu/nvss/
Reference Books
- Arthur Cox Allenճ Astrophysical Quantities
- George Rieke Measuring the Universe: a multiwavelength perspective
- Ian McLean, Electronic Imaging in Astronomy: Detectors and Instrumentation, Second Edition, 2008
- C.K. Walker, Terahertz Astronomy
- Jonathan M. Marr, Ronald L. Snell, Stanley E. Kurtz Fundamentals of Radio Astronomy: Observational Methods
- Bevington, P. R., and Robinson, D. K. 2002, Data Reduction and Error Analysis for the Physical Sciences
Review Articles
- M Bessell, Standard Photometric Systems, ARAA, 43, 293, 2005
- G Rieke, Infrared Detector Arrays for Astronomy, ARAA, 45, 2007
- R Davies & M Kaspar, Adaptive Optics for Astronomy, ARAA, 50, 305, 2012
- Taylor, G B, Carilli, C. L, Perley, R. A. (eds) Synthesis Imaging in Radio Astronomy II, ASP Vol. 180 (1998)
Technical Documents
- Basic Image Processing and CCD features : https://www.eso.org/~ohainaut/ccd/
- Starlink CCD Data Reduction Cookbook : http://www.starlink.ac.uk/docs/sc5.htx/sc5.html
- ALMA Technical Handbook : https://almascience.eso.org/documents-and-tools/latest/documents-and-tools/cycle8/alma-technical-handbook
- Gemini Data Reduction Workshop Presentations https://www.noao.edu/meetings/gdw/
- Cambridge Astronomical Survey Unit http://casu.ast.cam.ac.uk/surveys-projects/vst/technical
PDFs of Observational Techniques Lectures
Lecture 1 Facilities and Coordinates
Lecture 2 Earth’s atmosphere : emission, transmission
Lecture 3 Earth’s atmosphere : refraction and seeing
Lecture 4 Achieving High Resolution ; Adaptive Optics and Interferometry
Lecture 5 Telescopes
Lecture 5a JWST
Lecture 6 Detectors
Lecture 7 Imaging & Photometry
Lecture 8 Spectroscopy
Lecture 9 Proposals