Status of the Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA)
R. D. Gehrz, E. E. Becklin, J. de Buizer, T. Herter, L. D. Keller, A. Krabbe, P. M. Marcum, T. L. Roellig, G. H. L. Sandell, P. Temi, W. D. Vacca, E. T. Young, H. Zinnecker
The Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA), a joint U.S./German project, is a 2.5-meter infrared airborne telescope carried by a Boeing 747-SP that flies in the stratosphere at altitudes as high as 45,000 feet (13.72 km). This facility is capable of observing from 0.3 μm to 1.6 mm with an average transmission greater than 80 percent. SOFIA will be staged out of the NASA Dryden Flight Research Center aircraft operations facility at Palmdale, CA. The SOFIA Science Mission Operations (SMO) will be located at NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, CA. First science flights began in 2010 and a full operations schedule of up to one hundred 8 to 10 hour flights per year will be reached by 2014. The observatory is expected to operate until the mid 2030's. SOFIAs initial complement of seven focal plane instruments includes broadband imagers, moderate-resolution spectrographs that will resolve broad features due to dust and large molecules, and high-resolution spectrometers capable of studying the kinematics of atomic and molecular gas at sub-km/s resolution. We describe the SOFIA facility and outline the opportunities for observations by the general scientific community and for future instrumentation development. The operational characteristics of the SOFIA first-generation instruments are summarized. The status of the flight test program is discussed and we show First Light images obtained at wavelengths from 5.4 to 37 ïm with the FORCAST imaging camera. Additional information about SOFIA is available at http://www.sofia.usra.edu and http://www.sofia.usra.edu/Science/docs/SofiaScienceVision051809-1.pdf
Stratospheric balloons as a platform for the next large far infrared observatory
需要大型物理仪器和（或）大量冷冻剂的观测，如高空间分辨率远红外天文学，目前在空间进行观测仍面临技术限制。角分辨率和现有的观测能力受到特别大的影响。基于天基的平台有望补充现有的观测能力，提供以相对较少的努力部署相对较大的望远镜的手段，包括其他优势，如定期补充冷冻剂以及更换和/或更新仪器的可能性。计划中的欧洲平流层气球观测站旨在提供这些额外的大孔径远红外成像能力，从长远来看，将超过赫歇尔的空间分辨率。该计划的重点是可重复使用的平台执行定期飞行和操作概念，为研究人员提供基于建议的观测。因此，它的目的是在波长范围、空间分辨率能力和光度稳定性方面对其他机载、地基和天基观测站提供补充。虽然FIR能力是一个主要的长期目标，但ESBO将在其他波长范围内提供好处。在ESBO设计研究范围内，正在建造一个载有0.5米望远镜的原型平台，用于紫外和可见光观测，并正在研究下一代远红外望远镜的平台概念。UV/VIS原型平台预计将于2021年进行飞行。在本文中，我们将概述的科学和技术的动机，一个大口径气球为基础的FIR天文台和ESBO DS方法对这样的基础设施。其次，我们将介绍0.5 m UV/VIS平台的技术动机、科学案例和仪器。
