A simulated aerial view of a cluster of CARMA’s antenna telescopes. CARMA researchers will have the power of 15 such telescopes at their disposal.

CARMA gets a boost at Caltech

Caltech recently announced a $2.5 million award from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation to support the Combined Array for Research in Millimeter-Wave Astronomy (CARMA).

CARMA will become a frontline instrument for innovative research into the formation of galaxies, stars, planets, and the origins of life. At the increased level of instrumental sensitivity envisaged, CARMA will allow researchers to “see” almost to the edge of the universe, a few billion years after the Big Bang, and also to search comets, planet-forming disks, and the interstellar medium for chemical clues regarding the formation of complex organic molecules from which life may originate.

CARMA is a collaboration between Caltech and the University of California at Berkeley, the University of Illinois, and the University of Maryland. It will merge the six 10.4-millimeter antenna telescopes of Caltech’s Owens Valley Radio Observatory (OVRO) array with the nine 6.1-millimeter antenna telescopes of the Berkeley-Illinois-Maryland Association (BIMA) array.
Altogether, CARMA will sit on a high-elevation 7,200-foot site at Cedar Flat near Big Pine, California. First light is anticipated for this fall, and full operation is expected in 2006.

The Moore Foundation grant will be used for relocation of the 15 antennas; construction of a control center; provision of antenna pads and associated infrastructure; design and construction of a telescope transporter; development of state-of-the-art electronics and software; and other enhancements to ensure the successful integration into a single system for optimal performance.

The relocation to Cedar Flat will allow for atmospheric transparency that is a factor of two greater than at the existing OVRO Observatory. With the improved atmospheric conditions, more telescopes, and updated electronics, the new facility will have 10 times the sensitivity and imaging speed of the current instruments.

“CARMA builds on the pioneering technical and scientific achievements of the OVRO and BIMA arrays over the last 20 years,” says Anneila Sargent, Rosen Professor of Astronomy and director of OVRO and CARMA. “While CARMA will ensure our ability to undertake cutting-edge research, it will also serve a critical role as a university instrument. This new merged array will encourage the exploration of new technologies and techniques and will be a key component in training the next generation of United States millimeter-wave radio astronomers.”

Sargent concludes, “If someone asks me these days, ‘How’s your karma?’, I tell them, ‘My CARMA is good!’”

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