[en] The present article is based upon an invited talk delivered at the occasion of the inaugu-
ration of the 4m International Liquid Mirror Telescope (ILMT) which took place in Devasthal
(ARIES, Uttarakhand, India) on 21st of March 2023. We present hereafter a short history of the
liquid mirror telescopes and in particular of the 4m ILMT which is the first liquid mirror tele-
scope entirely dedicated to astrophysical observations. We discuss a few preliminary scientific results and illustrate some direct CCD images taken during the first commissioning phase of the telescope. We invite the reader to refer to the series of ILMT poster papers published in these same proceedings of the BINA3 workshop for more details about the instrument, operation, first observations, performance and scientific results.
Disciplines :
Space science, astronomy & astrophysics
Author, co-author :
Surdej, Jean ; Université de Liège - ULiège > Département d'astrophysique, géophysique et océanographie (AGO)
Bhavya Ailawadhi; Aryabhatta Research Institute of Observational sciencES, Nainital, India
Talat Akhunov; National University of Uzbekistan, Tashkent, Uzbekista ; Ulugh Beg Astronomical Institute, Tashkent, Uzbekistan
Ermanno Borra; Laval University, Quebec, Canada
Monalisa Dubey; Aryabhatta Research Institute of Observational sciencES, Nainital, India ; Mahatma Jyotiba Phule Rohilkhand University, Bareilly, India
Naveen Dukiya; Aryabhatta Research Institute of Observational sciencES, Nainital, India ; 7Mahatma Jyotiba Phule Rohilkhand University, Bareilly, India
Jiuyang Fu; University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada
Baldeep Grewal; University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada
Paul Hickson; University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada
Brajesh Kumar; Aryabhatta Research Institute of Observational sciencES, Nainital, India
Kuntal Misra; Aryabhatta Research Institute of Observational sciencES, Nainital, India
Vibhore Negi; Aryabhatta Research Institute of Observational sciencES, Nainital, India ; Deen Dayal Upadhyay Gorakhpur University, Gorakhpur, India
Anna Pospieszalska-Surdej; Institute of Astrophysics and Geophysics, Liège University, Belgium
Kumar Pranshu; Aryabhatta Research Institute of Observational sciencES, Nainital, India ; University of Calcutta, Kolkata, India
Ethen Sun; University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada
Borra, E. F. (2003) Cosmology at low redshifts. A&A, 404, 47–55. https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361:20030487.
Capocci, E. (1850) Letter to the Royal Academy of Sciences in Brussels, Belgium. Read at a meeting on 2 November 1850.
Fukugita, M., Ichikawa, T., Gunn, J. E., Doi, M., Shimasaku, K. and Schneider, D. P. (1996) The Sloan Digital Sky Survey photometric system. AJ, 111, 1748. https://doi.org/10.1086/ 117915.
Gibson, B. K. (1991) Liquid Mirror Telescopes: History. JRASC, 85, 158–171. https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1991JRASC..85..158G.
Gibson, B. K. and Hickson, P. (1992) Time–delay integration CCD read–out technique: Image deformation. MNRAS, 258(3), 543–551. https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/258.3.543.
Hickson, P., Ailawadhi, B., Akhunov, T., Borra, E., Dubey, M., Dukiya, N., Fu, J., Grewal, B., Kumar, B., Misra, K., Negi, V., Pranshu, K., Sun, E. and Surdej, J. (2024) Serendipitous detection of orbital debris by the International Liquid Mirror Telescope: First results. BSRSL, 93(2), 903–909. https://doi.org/10.25518/0037-9565.11920.
Hickson, P., Borra, E. F., Cabanac, R., Content, R., Gibson, B. K. and Walker, G. A. H. (1994) UBC/Laval 2.7 meter liquid mirror telescope. ApJ, 436, L201–L204. https://doi.org/10.1086/ 187667.
Hickson, P., Pfrommer, T., Cabanac, R., Crotts, A., Johnson, B., de Lapparent, V., Lanzetta, K. M., Gromoll, S., Mulrooney, M. K., Sivanandam, S. and Truax, B. (2007) The Large Zenith Telescope: A 6 m liquid-mirror telescope. PASP, 119, 444–455. https://doi.org/10.1086/517621.
Hickson, P. and Richardson, E. H. (1998) A curvature-compensated corrector for drift-scan observations. PASP, 110(751), 1081–1086. https://doi.org/10.1086/316230.
Kumar, B., Kumar, H., Dangwal, K. S., Rawat, H., Misra, K., Negi, V., Jaiswar, M. K., Dukiya, N., Ailawadhi, B., Hickson, P. and Surdej, J. (2022) First light preparations of the 4m ILMT. JAI, 11, 2240003. https://doi.org/10.1142/S2251171722400037.
Kumar, B., Pandey, K. L., Pandey, S. B., Hickson, P., Borra, E. F., Anupama, G. C. and Surdej, J. (2018) The zenithal 4-m International Liquid Mirror Telescope: a unique facility for supernova studies. MNRAS, 476(2), 2075–2085. https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/sty298.
Pospieszalska-Surdej, A., Ailawadhi, B., Akhunov, T., Borra, E., Dubey, M., Dukiya, N., Fu, J., Grewal, B., Hickson, P., Kumar, B., Misra, K., Negi, V., Pranshu, K., Sun, E. and Surdej, J. (2024) Detection and identification of asteroids with the 4 m ILMT. BSRSL, 93(2), 941–947. https://doi.org/10.25518/0037-9565.11931.
Potter, A. E. and Mulrooney, M. (1997) Liquid metal mirror for optical measurements of orbital debris. AdSpR, 19(2), 213–219. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0273-1177(97)00003-3.
Refsdal, S. and Surdej, J. (1994) Gravitational lenses. RPPh, 57(2), 117–185. https://doi.org/10.1088/0034-4885/57/2/001.
Sica, R. J., Sargoytchev, S., Argall, P. S., Borra, E. F., Girard, L., Sparrow, C. T. and Flatt, S. (1995) Lidar measurements taken with a large-aperture liquid mirror. 1. Rayleigh-scatter system. AO, 34(30), 6925–6936. https://doi.org/10.1364/AO.34.006925.
Surdej, J., Absil, O., Bartczak, P., Borra, E., Chisogne, J.-P., Claeskens, J.-F., Collin, B., De Becker, M., Defrère, D., Denis, S., Flebus, C., Garcet, O., Gloesener, P., Jean, C., Lampens, P., Libbrecht, C., Magette, A., Manfroid, J., Mawet, D., Nakos, T., Ninane, N., Poels, J., Pospieszalska, A., Riaud, P., Sprimont, P.-G. and Swings, J.-P. (2006) The 4m international liquid mirror telescope (ILMT). In Ground-based and Airborne Telescopes, edited by Stepp, L. M., vol. 6267. International Society for Optics and Photonics, SPIE. https://doi.org/10.1117/12.671695.
Surdej, J., Hickson, P., Borra, E., Swings, J.-P., Habraken, S., Akhunov, T., Bartczak, P., Chand, H., De Becker, M., Delchambre, L., Finet, F., Kumar, B., Pandey, A., Pospieszalska, A., Pradhan, B., Sagar, R., Wertz, O., De Cat, P., Denis, S., de Ville, J., Jaiswar, M. K., Lampens, P., Nanjappa, N. and Tortolani, J.-M. (2018) The 4-m International Liquid Mirror Telescope. BSRSL, 87, 68–79. https://doi.org/10.25518/0037-9565.7498.
Surdej, J., Hickson, P., Kumar, B. and Misra, K. (2022) First light with the 4-m International Liquid Mirror Telescope. Physics News, 52, 25–28.
Wuerker, R. F. (2002) Arctic lidar at Univ. of California/Los Angeles’ HIPAS Observatory. In Optical Spectroscopic Techniques, Remote Sensing, and Instrumentation for Atmospheric and Space Research IV, edited by Larar, A. M. and Mlynczak, M. G., vol. 4485, pp. 292–302. SPIE. https://doi.org/10.1117/12.454264.
