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Astronomy from 80 Degrees North on Ellesmere Island, Canada

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 January 2013

Eric Steinbring*
Affiliation:
National Research Council of Canada, 5071 West Saanich Rd, Victoria, BC V9E 2E7, Canada email: [email protected]
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Abstract

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Site testing carried out on Ellesmere Island over recent years has shown that mountainous coastal terrain there can provide high clear-sky fractions in the long dark season, with low precipitable water-vapour column and prospects for excellent seeing. This presents new possibilities for time-domain and survey-mode science in the northern hemisphere, allowing uninterrupted high-precision photometry in the optical/near-infrared, but also gains in the submillimetre/millimetre. Efforts underway at the Eureka research station, at 80 degrees latitude, are reviewed. This location provides year-round access to a nearby site being developed as a pathfinder observatory. A program of variable-star and transient searches involving a wide-field imaging system has begun, with some early results. Plans include extrasolar-planet hunting via transit surveys, and future directions are discussed.

Type
Contributed Papers
Copyright
Copyright © International Astronomical Union 2013

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