BLAST (telescope)

BLAST
BLAST hanging from the launch vehicle in Esrange near Kiruna, Sweden before launch in June 2005
Alternative namesBalloon-borne Large Aperture Submillimeter Telescope Edit this at Wikidata
Wavelength250, 350, 500 μm (1.20, 0.86, 0.60 THz)
Telescope styleballoon-borne telescope
radio telescope Edit this on Wikidata
Diameter2 m (6 ft 7 in) Edit this at Wikidata
Websitesites.northwestern.edu/blast/ Edit this at Wikidata
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The Balloon-borne Large Aperture Submillimeter Telescope (BLAST) is a submillimeter telescope that hangs from a high-altitude balloon. It has a 2-meter primary mirror that directs light into bolometer arrays operating at 250, 350, and 500 μm. These arrays were developed for the SPIRE instrument on the Herschel Space Observatory. The project is carried out by a multi-university consortium headed by the University of Pennsylvania and which also includes University of Toronto, Brown University, the University of Miami, the University of British Columbia, JPL, INAOE, and Cardiff University. The third flight of BLAST in Antarctica was a scientific success, but much of telescope was destroyed after landing. It has been rebuilt for a flight from Antarctica in the 2010-11 austral summer. This most recent flight of BLAST (aka BLAST-Pol) has a polarimeter to observe the polarized light from star forming cores. The light is polarized due to magnetic fields. It is thought that the magnetic fields inhibit the collapse of the cores. The Herschel Space Observatory does not have a polarimeter.

BLAST's primary science goals are:[1]

  • Measure photometric redshifts, rest-frame FIR luminosities and star formation rates of high-redshift starburst galaxies, thereby constraining the evolutionary history of those galaxies that produce the FIR/submillimeter background.
  • Measure cold pre-stellar sources associated with the earliest stages of star and planet formation.
  • Make high-resolution maps of diffuse galactic emission over a wide range of galactic latitudes.

Filmmaker Paul Devlin made a documentary film titled BLAST! about the project.[2] Paul is the brother of cosmologist Mark Devlin, Principal Investigator of the BLAST project.[3]

  1. ^ BLAST Public Webpage Archived 2011-06-03 at the Wayback Machine
  2. ^ A trailer can be seen at http://www.blastthemovie.com/
  3. ^ Culture Dish Archived 2011-07-08 at the Wayback Machine, Nature vol 454, July 2008