The South Pole Telescope Blog

Talk of the Nation will be doing a piece on the South Pole Telescope this afternoon. Tune in and listen or check their website after 6 (EST) today for the piece.

Upcoming Live Webcast: Dec. 21 2007

Be sure to visit the Exploratorium's website for another live webcast from pole on Dec. 21, 2007 at 8 am CST.

Be sure to head on over to the Exploratorium's site tomorrow at 9:00 CST to join us for a live webcast with members of the SPT team at pole. This is a great opportunity to ask SPT scientists questions about their research.

The last few weeks at pole we have been busy characterizing our detectors (Kathryn talks about her work on this here), preparing our receiver for an upgrade and improving the surface of our primary mirror. On the primary mirror, we hope to achieve a surface smoothness of 20 microns (less than the thickness of a human hair), which is quite an accomplishment across a 10 meter dish! Back in the states, we have been busy fabricating and testing new pixels for the camera this season. Here is a (seasonably appropriate) photo of one of new bolometers magnified 500x under a scanning electron microscope (SEM). Click here or here for more information on our detectors. For more on the SEM check out these links (background, gallery).