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Higher, bigger, more precise: the AtLAST design study is coming to an end

Since 2021, the telescope experts at OHB Digital Connect in Mainz have been working on the Horizon 2020 study "AtLAST: Towards an Atacama Large Aperture Submillimeter Telescope" (GA No. 951815) together with the research partners University of Oslo, the European Southern Observatory (ESO), the UK Research Institute Edinburgh, and the University of Hertfordshire.

AtLAST is a future radio telescope with a reflector diameter of 50 m, which will one day be built on the Chajnantor plateau at around 5000 m above sea level in the Chilean Atacama Desert. The telescope will be able to capture electromagnetic signals in the (sub)millimeter range and map the sky in a short time with its large field of view. AtLAST would be the world's most precise and dynamic telescope in this size class.

From May 21 to 24, 2024, the final conference of the AtLAST study took place at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz under the motto "AtLAST Design Study: Results, Science, and Next Steps". The conference brought together around 80 scientists from all over the world and from various disciplines. Astronomers, telescope engineers, renewable energy systems researchers and astronomical instrumentation experts discussed in detail the collaborative efforts undertaken to realize AtLAST's transformative observational capabilities and make it the first sustainable large-scale astronomical facility.

The revolutionary observational capabilities extend from the sun to the edge of the universe and everything in between. By mapping large portions of the sky at all scales and throughout the submillimeter range from 10 mm to 350 μm, AtLAST can measure the entire gas and dust content of our universe, including the diffuse and faint matter that cannot be detected by current facilities. AtLAST will enable scientists to constrain the elusive life cycle of gas and dust inside and outside galaxies at all cosmic epochs, allowing them to understand the interplay between gravity, radiation, magnetic fields, chemistry and turbulence. In addition, AtLAST will be transformative by providing observations of the submillimeter sky, including our own Sun, with the highest time resolution, sensitivity and angular resolution.

As part of the conference, participants had the opportunity to visit the workshops of OHB Digital Connect in Mainz, where various components of current and future telescopes such as the MeerKAT extension and the Giant Magellan Telescope are being developed.

Further information on the project can be found at: www.atlast.uio.no/