ACT Telescope

Act telescope

Atacama Cosmology Telescope

The Atacama Cosmology Telescope

The goals of the ACT project are to study how the universe began, what it is made of, and how it evolved to its current state. This pursuit is part of the field of scientific cosmology in one which asks questions about the Universe on the largest and grandest scales. Over the past two decades, there has been a tremendous flourishing of the field, driven by many excellent astronomical measurements. This has led to the development of a precise and elegant understanding of cosmology.

The Atacama Cosmology Telescope (ACT) is a six-metre telescope on Cerro Toco in theAtacama Desert in the north of Chile, near theLlano de Chajnantor Observatory. It is designed to make high-resolution, microwave-wavelength surveys of the sky in order to study the cosmic microwave background radiation (CMB). At an altitude of 5190 metres (17,030 feet), it is one of the highest permanent, ground-based telescopes in the world.

ACT experiment has two main goals to further our knowledge of cosmology:

1. To improve on the measurements of parameters which describe the very early universe
2. To measure distant, large clusters of galaxies and their environments.

Erected in the (austral) autumn of 2007, ACT saw first light on 22 October 2007 with its science receiver, the Millimeter BolometerArray Camera (MBAC), and completed its first season in December 2007. It began its second season of observations in June 2008.

The project is a collaboration betweenPrinceton University, Cornell University, theUniversity of Pennsylvania, NASA/GSFC, theJohns Hopkins University, the University of British Columbia, NIST, the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, the University of KwaZulu-Natal, Cardiff University, Rutgers University, the University of Pittsburgh,Columbia University, Haverford College, West Chester University, INAOE, LLNL, NASA/JPL, the University of Toronto, the University of Cape Town, the University of Massachusetts Amherst and York College, CUNY. It is funded by the US National Science Foundation.