Welcome to the new version of CaltechAUTHORS. Login is currently restricted to library staff. If you notice any issues, please email coda@library.caltech.edu
Published March 2020 | Submitted
Journal Article Open

The Zwicky Transient Facility: Observing System

Abstract

The Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF) Observing System (OS) is the data collector for the ZTF project to study astrophysical phenomena in the time domain. ZTF OS is based upon the 48 inch aperture Schmidt-type design Samuel Oschin Telescope at the Palomar Observatory in Southern California. It incorporates new telescope aspheric corrector optics, dome and telescope drives, a large-format exposure shutter, a flat-field illumination system, a robotic bandpass filter exchanger, and the key element: a new 47-square-degree, 600 megapixel cryogenic CCD mosaic science camera, along with supporting equipment. The OS collects and delivers digitized survey data to the ZTF Data System (DS). Here, we describe the ZTF OS design, optical implementation, delivered image quality, detector performance, and robotic survey efficiency.

Additional Information

© 2020 The Astronomical Society of the Pacific. Received 2019 July 31; accepted 2019 September 6; published 2020 January 28. Based on observations obtained with the Samuel Oschin Telescope 48 inch and the 60 inch Telescope at the Palomar Observatory as part of the Zwicky Transient Facility project. ZTF is supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. AST-1440341 and a collaboration including Caltech, IPAC, the Weizmann Institute for Science, the Oskar Klein Center at Stockholm University, the University of Maryland, the University of Washington (UW), Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron and Humboldt University, Los Alamos National Laboratories, the TANGO Consortium of Taiwan, the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee, and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratories. Operations are conducted by Caltech Optical Observatories (COO), IPAC, and UW.

Attached Files

Submitted - 2008.04923.pdf

Submitted - The_Zwicky_Transient_Facility_Observing_System.pdf

Files

2008.04923.pdf
Files (13.0 MB)
Name Size Download all
md5:fe7b979915a927059c64e07cf56c8ffb
6.5 MB Preview Download
md5:6af398c2e46f2ea1626666a1025cfcb5
6.5 MB Preview Download

Additional details

Created:
August 19, 2023
Modified:
October 18, 2023