The angular resolution that can be obtained by ground-based aperture synthesis telescopes at millimeter and submillimeter wavelengths is limited by phase fluctuations caused by water vapor in the Earth's atmosphere. We describe here the successful correction of such fluctuations during observations at 0.85 mm wavelength with an interferometer consisting of the James Clark Maxwell Telescope and the Caltech Submillimeter Observatory. This was achieved by using two 183 GHz heterodyne radiometers to measure the water vapor content along the line of sight of each telescope. Further development of such techniques will enable future telescopes, such as the Submillimeter Array and the Atacama Large Millimeter Array, to reach their full capability, providing a resolution of up to 001.
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机译:地面孔径合成望远镜在毫米和亚毫米波长处可获得的角分辨率受到地球大气中水蒸气引起的相位波动的限制。我们在这里描述了由James Clark Maxwell望远镜和Caltech亚毫米天文台组成的干涉仪在0.85 mm波长的观测过程中对这种波动的成功校正。这是通过使用两个183 GHz外差辐射计测量沿每个望远镜视线的水汽含量来实现的。此类技术的进一步发展将使未来的望远镜(例如亚毫米阵列和阿塔卡马大型毫米阵列)能够发挥其全部功能,提供高达001的分辨率。
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