General information
-
Hosting OrganisationIRAM - INSTITUT DE RADIOASTRONOMIE MILLIMETRIQUE
-
AdressPico Veleta, Sierra Nevada (Granada, Spain)
-
Contact Info:
-
Phone
-
Emailinfo@iram.es
Description
The Institut de Radioastronomie Millimétrique (IRAM) was founded in 1979 and is operated as a French-German-Spanish collaboration. Its partner institutions are the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) in France, the Max Planck Gesellschaft (MPG) in Germany and the Instituto Geográfico Nacional (IGN) in Spain. The IGN participates with a fraction of investment and operation expenses and, in return, IGN gets a fraction of the observing time on each IRAM telescopes and a participation in Administrative and Technical Committees. The observatories are supported by the IRAM offices and laboratories in Granada and Grenoble.
IRAM operates two observatories, the NOEMA Interferometer at the Plateau de Bure (France) and the observatory at Pico Veleta located in Sierra Nevada (Granada, Spain), 2850 m high.
Partnership with national and international space research organisations includes ESA, NASA and CNES. IRAM also is a major partner in the international ALMA project, the giant radio observatory in the Chilean desert.
Main equipment or Facilities
The observatory at Loma de Dílar, close to Pico Veleta in Sierra Nevada hosts an open air, millimeter single-dish radio telescope of 30 m diameter with a paraboloidal main reflector. The mount is Alt-azimuth and fully steerable, made of steel on a concrete pedestal. The telescope has a homologous design and is thermally controlled and the reflector surface precision is 55 microns. The total weight of the moving parts is 800 tons. The frequency range of operation 73 to 350 GHz and the angular resolution 30 to 7.5 arcsec. Backends for continuum, spectroscopy and VLBI observations are available.
The instrumentation comprises two high-performance receivers: EMIR (Eight MIxer Receiver) is a four-band heterodyne receiver with dual-polarization covering the range between 73 and 350 GHz. Instantaneous observation of two bands with a usable bandwidth of 16 GHz and two polarisations are possible. NIKA2 (New IRAM KID Array 2) is a dual-band camera operating with three frequency-multiplexed kilopixels arrays of Lumped Element Kinetic Inductance Detectors (LEKID) cooled at 150mK. NIKA2 is designed to observe simultaneously the intensity at 1.15 mm (260 GHz, 2 x 1140 pixel arrays -one per polarisation) and 2.0 mm (150 GHz, 1 x 616 pixel array). In addition, it allows for polarisation observations at 1.15 mm. NIKA2 is built by an international consortium, led by the Institute Neel (Grenoble, France).
In addition to the receivers, several spectrometers are available for the heterodyne receivers: the Fast Fourier Transform Spectrometer (FTS) with 32 GHz bandwidth and 200 kHz resolution or 8 GHz bandwidth and 50 kHz resolution. The WILMA autocorrelator with 18 units of 1 GHz bandwidth and 2 MHz resolution; and the VESPA autocorrelator with a very high resolution of up to 3.3 kHz. In addition, the telescope is equipped with a Very Long Baseline Interferometry (VLBI) terminal.
Projects under Development
IRAM is currently carrying out an ambitious upgrade of the 30m telescope in two areas: (a) modernisation of the servo-control system, including azimuth and elevation trains, subreflector control and wobbling system, and (b) improvement of the primary mirror (reflector) surface accuracy, thermal behaviour and gain-elevation curve. The activities started in 2.021 and will extend well within 2.023. Moreover, IRAM is currently developing new multi-beam heterodyne receivers in two bands at a wavelength of 3 mm (5 x 5 pixel) and 1 mm (7 x 7 pixel). Prototype instruments are currently in development. A 3 mm HEMT prototype is currently undergoing tests at the observatory
Technology Capabilities
Design of parabolae and their control systems, design and production of ultra-sensitive super conducting detectors and complex receiver systems, high-speed digital electronics and advanced data reduction software. Groups and laboratories at IRAM: Frontend team; SISLab; Backend team; Mechanical workshop group; Computer group. The IRAM workshop is equipped with the latest generation of CNC lathes and milling machines and non-contact measuring microscopes.
Summary of Research Services
The observing time must be obtained by international competition. Proposals for observations with the IRAM telescopes may be submitted twice per year through the Proposal Management System PMS. The submission period starts about three weeks before a deadline. Submission deadlines are currently around mid-March and mid-September each year for the Summer (01 June-30 November) and Winter (01 December-31 May) scheduling periods.
Procurement process
Main contracts are awarded by IRAM-Grenoble. Moreover, the local contracts related to the operation of the IRAM 30-m radiotelescope (both for goods and services) are awarded by IRAM-Granada. In both cases, IRAM performs as a private company subjected to the French or the Spanish law, respectively.