For a quick guide to AAT instrument sensitivities go to the Appendices

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Pages which have not been updated or checked are marked with a . Note that this doesn't necessarily mean this information is out of date - merely that it could be.

Contents

1. General Information
   • The Anglo-Australian Observatory
   • How to contact the Observatory
   • The telescope site
   • The Epping Laboratory
   • Documentation    
   • How to apply for AAT time
     • ATAC applications
     • PATT applications
     • Requests for service observing
   • Schmidt Telescope applications
     • Photographic material
     • FLAIR II applications
   • Travel and accommodation    
     • Visa and immigration requirements
     • Accommodation in Sydney
     • Getting to the Epping Laboratory
     • Travel between Sydney and Coonabarabran
     • Accommodation on Siding Spring mountain
   • Shipping equipment to Australia
     • Goods not owned by the AAO
     • Goods owned by the AAO
   • Preparing for an observing run
     • Before arriving
     • At the telescope
     • After the observing run
   • The AAT data archive
   • The ROE Plate Library
2. The Anglo-Australian Telescope
   • General description
   • Prime focus
     • Correctors
     • Central obscuration and baffling
     • Prime focus offset guider
     • Attaching special instruments at prime focus
   • Cassegrain focus
     • Focal ratios
     • Central obscuration and baffling
     • Acquisition and guiding assembly
     • Chopping secondary
     • Attaching special instruments at Cassegrain
   • Coudé focus
   • Range of telescope movement
   • The telescope control system
     • Hardware
     • Operation
     • Pointing and tracking
     • Differential tracking
     • Source coordinates
     • Offsetting
     • Scanning modes
     • Assorted utilities
     • The data catalogue
   • The TV finder
   • Autoguiding
   • Seeing measurements
   • The AAT building
     • The dome
     • Access to the telescope foci
     • Power, lighting and services
3. The Schmidt Telescope
   • Background
   • Surveys
   • The telescope
     • Optics
     • Objective prisms
     • Sub-beam prism and objective grating
     • Filters
   • Photographic plates
     • Hypersensitising
     • Plate uniformity
     • Calibration
     • Ghosts, spikes and haloes
     • Photographic film
   • The FLAIR multi-object spectroscopy system
4. Instrumentation at the AAT
   • Current instruments and detectors
     • Fully supported instruments
     • Other instruments
   • OBSERVER instrument control system
   • Large external memory
   • The Two-degree Field project                 Missing the 2dF images!
5. Spectrographs
   • The RGO Spectrograph
   • The Coudé Echelle Spectrograph (UCLES)
   • The Faint Object Red Spectrograph (FORS)
   • The Low Dispersion Survey Spectrograph (LDSS)
   • Multi-object spectroscopy with optical fibres
     • FOCAP
     • AUTOFIB
   • Spectropolarimetry
   • Taurus II
   • Area spectroscopy with ASPECT
6. Optical detectors
   • CCD detectors
     • Data acquisition
     • The TEK CCD
     • The Thomson CCDs
     • The RCA CCD
     • The GEC CCDs
   • The IPCS
   • Choosing a detector
     • Signal-to-Noise
     • Detector size
     • Real time data display
     • Saturation
     • Cosmic ray events
     • Cosmetics
     • Instrumental throughput
7. Direct imaging and photometry
   • Prime focus photography
     • Prime focus characteristics
     • Photographic plates
   • Prime focus CCD imaging at f/3.3
   • The LBL wide-field imaging system
   • CCD imaging at auxiliary focus
   • The auxiliary focus photometer
8. Infrared instrumentation
   • IRIS                               Missing the IRIS images & latest performance estimates
     • The detector
     • Wavelength sensitivity
     • Instrument control
     • Imaging
     • Spectroscopy
     • Polarimetry
   • The infrared photometer-spectrometer, IRPS
     • Photometry
     • Continuous mode
   • The Fabry-Perot infrared grating spectrometer, FIGS
     • Combining FIGS and IRPS
9. Computing facilities
   • Computer hardware
   • Network connections
   • Data reduction and analysis facilities
   • Text processing and PCs
   • Computers at the Schmidt telescope
10. Measuring machines
    • PDS microdensitometer
    • Bolton measuring machines
    • Joyce-Löbl microdensitometer
    • Zeiss comparators
11. The AAO libraries
    • Books and journals
    • Special resources and facilities
    • Sky surveys and atlases
      • At Epping
      • At Siding Spring

Appendices

Appendix A : Summary of AAT facts and figures

Appendix B : Sensitivities of AAT instruments - a quick guide    

• RGO Spectrograph                                   Now updated to reflect TEK CCD performance!
• UCL Echelle Spectrograph (UCLES)      Now updated to reflect TEK CCD performance!
• Faint Object Red Spectrograph (FORS)
• Low-Dispersion Survey Spectrograph (LDSS)
• Taurus
• Prime Focus Imaging with CCDs            Now updated to reflect TEK CCD performance!
• Photography
• IRIS                    Missing the latest performance estimates
• FIGS

List of Tables
List of Figures
References