Transformation of the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope

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Transformation of the James Clerk
Maxwell Telescope

• Astronet Infrastructure Roadmap Symposium
• 18th June 2008
• Gary Davis, Director

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Key Science Results
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Transformation of the JCMT

• Science Driver
• limited to date by small sample sizes
• shift to study of statistically-significant
  samples
• Strategy
• capitalise on strengths of a large, single dish
• replace the entire instrument suite with new
  instruments optimised for wide-field astronomy
• total investment 30M

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Transformation of the JCMT
FTS-2
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HARP/ACSIS
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SCUBA-2

• Key Features
• simultaneous imaging at 450 850µm
• sensitivity governed by sky background
• large field of view gt 50 sq arcmin
• fully sampled images in lt 4 s
• novel scanning strategies

SCUBA-2 will map the submm sky up to 1000 times
faster than SCUBA!
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SCUBA-2 is in the building!
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JCMT Legacy Survey

• Seven survey projects

82
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GBS Result Serpens
12CO 32
velocity
Blue

Red
GBS team, unpublished
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NGS Result SINGS Galaxies
NGS team, unpublished
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AstroNet Science Vision

• How do galaxies form and evolve?
• matter density fluctuations in the early universe
• the first seeds of galaxies
• evolution of the galaxy cluster mass function
• metallicity of the warm-hot phase of the
  intergalactic medium in the local universe
• build up of gas, dust, magnetic fields and masses
  of galaxies

• What is the origin and evolution of stars and
  planets?
• initial conditions of star formation, evolution
  of molecular clouds, formation and development of
  cloud structure, mass distribution of stars
• life cycle of matter from the interstellar
  medium, through processing in stars and back into
  the diffuse medium
• the process of planet formation
• characterise the population of planetary systems

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Introduction to the JCMT

• Vital Statistics
• first light 1987
• primary diameter 15m
• surface accuracy 22µm rms
• Gore-Tex membrane
• located on Mauna Kea, Hawaii
• submillimetre range 450µm1.1mm
• partnership
• 55 UK
• 25 Canada
• 20 Netherlands
• member of RadioNet