Extragalactic science with ALMA

Abstract

The Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) is a telescope comprising 66 antennas that is located in the Atacama Desert in Chile, one of the driest locations on Earth. When the telescope is fully operational, it will perform observations over ten receiver bands at wavelengths from 9.5-0.32 mm (31-950 GHz) with unprecedented sensitivities to continuum emission from cold (<20 K) dust, Bremsstrahlung, and synchrotron emission as well as submillimetre and millimetre molecular lines. With baselines out to 16km and dynamic reconfiguration, ALMA will achieve spatial resolutions ranging from 3″ to 0.010″, allowing for detailed imaging of continuum or molecular line emission from 0.1-1 kpc scale gas and dust discs in high-redshift sources or 10-100 pc scale molecular clouds and substructures within nearby galaxies. Science observations started on 30 September 2011 with 16 antennas and four receiver bands on baselines up to 400 m. The telescope's capabilities will steadily improve until full operations begin in 2013.