Univ. of Cambridge Joins MRO Group

by George Zamora

WASHINGTON, D.C., Friday, June 21, 2002 -- Officials from the University of Cambridge in England, representatives from a university research consortium headed by New Mexico Tech, adminsitrators of the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory, and a delegation of New Mexico's U.S. senators and representatives are meeting in Washington, D.C. this morning to participate in a signing ceremony marking the first phase of what is now an international scientific collaboration to design, develop, and operate the Magdalena Ridge Observatory.

The MRO is slated to be a premier, state-of-the-art astronomical research facility that will employ an array of optical/infrared telescopes to produce extremely detailed images of the far reaches of the universe, beginning in late 2007.

Once completed, the innovative optical and infrared telescope will sit among the main ridge of the Magdalena Mountains in west-central New Mexico at an elevation of 10,600 feet above sea level, making it the fourth highest observatory site in the world.

By using optical interferometry, the MRO facility will electronically link its open arrangement of eight to ten 1.4- meter telescopes to simulate the potential magnifying and resolving power of a single 400-meter telescope, much in the same way the Very Large Array (VLA) radio telescope links its 27 separate radio receivers to form one gigantic instrument.

The feasibility of using interferometry technology for arrays of optical telescopes was first demonstrated by a research team of University of Cambridge scientists in the late 1980s, and later resulted in the same team building the Cambridge Optical Aperture Synthesis Telescope--the world's first separated-element optical/infrared aperture synthesis telescope.

The Cambridge scientists will now join researchers in the MRO consortium to apply similar interferometry techniques to the larger-scaled MRO facility array.

One of the designs being considered for MRO's array of telescopes is based on the VLA's Y-shaped arrangement of moveable telescopes, and spreads out the optical telescopes over an area larger than a football stadium.

Images of faraway planets, stars, and galaxies will be obtained by each of MRO's telescopes and stored in computers for later "cutting and pasting" to form larger, more detailed single images of the celestial objects being observed.

In addition, computers will drive optical components at the MRO facility to constantly compensate and correct for optical disturbances caused by atmospheric turbulence -- a cutting-edge technology known as "adaptive optics."

Federal funding for the research facility, which will eventually cost $45 million, has been secured through the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory, the government lead agency for the project; while the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory has supplied adaptive optics expertise and hardware for MRO.

The design, development, and operation of the observatory is under the auspices of a university research consortium, with New Mexico Tech as the lead institute. Additional members of the consortium include New Mexico State University, New Mexico Highlands University, and the University of Puerto Rico, as well as Los Alamos National Laboratory.