Stuart Ryder (AAO)

Stuart Ryder Colloquium: A Night on SOFIA

Marsfield Lecture Theatre

Abstract

Earlier this year I had the rare opportunity to fly on NASA's
Stratospheric Observatory For Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA), a Boeing 747 with a
2.5m telescope that flies above 40,000 ft and most of the atmospheric water
vapour that absorbs far-infrared radiation. In this talk I will outline what
it took to get SOFIA off the ground, and give an inside look at what
observing with the world's only flying telescope is like.