Ebook: Science with the VLT in the ELT Era

The Workshop “Science with the VLT in the ELT Era” held in Garching from 8th to 12th October 2007 was organised by ESO, with support from its Scienti c and Technical Committee, to provide a forum for the astronomical community to debate the long term future of ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) and its interferometric mode (VLTI). In particular it was considered useful for future planning to evaluate how its science use may evolve over the next decade due to competition and/or synergy with new facilities such as ALMA, JWST and, hopefully, at least one next generation 30–40 m extremely large telescope whose acronym appears in the title to symbolise this wider context. These discussions were also held in the fresh light of the Science Vision recently developed within ASTRONET as the rst step towards a 20 year plan for implementing astronomical facilities—the rst such attempt within Europe. Speci c ideas and proposals for new, second generation VLT/I instruments were also solicited following a tradition set by several earlier Workshops held since the start of the VLT development. The programme consisted of invited talks and reviews and contributed talks and posters. Almost all those given are included here although, unfortunately not the several lively but constructive discussion sessions.

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The Workshop ‘Science with the VLT in the ELT era’ was organised by ESO as a forum for the astronomical community to debate its expected future use of ESO’s Very Large Telescope ( and its VLTI interferometric mode) when other facilities such as ALMA, JWST and, hopefully, at least one extremely large 30-40m class telescope will be operating. VLT/I science highlights were presented, future science priorities argued, synergies between the VLT and the future facilities confirmed and specific new VLT/I instruments proposed.

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The Workshop ‘Science with the VLT in the ELT era’ was organised by ESO as a forum for the astronomical community to debate its expected future use of ESO’s Very Large Telescope ( and its VLTI interferometric mode) when other facilities such as ALMA, JWST and, hopefully, at least one extremely large 30-40m class telescope will be operating. VLT/I science highlights were presented, future science priorities argued, synergies between the VLT and the future facilities confirmed and specific new VLT/I instruments proposed.

Content:
Front Matter....Pages i-xxv
Front Matter....Pages 1-1
VLT Science Highlights....Pages 3-14
Pushing the VLT Spectroscopy of Distant Galaxies to the Limits and Future Prospects....Pages 15-21
Pushing FORS to the Limit—A New Population of Faint Extended Ly? Emitters at z?3....Pages 23-26
VIMOS Integral Field Spectroscopy of Gaseous Nebulae in Local Group Dwarf Galaxies....Pages 27-28
Near IR Integral Field Spectroscopy of a Nearby Starburst....Pages 29-30
The ESO Large Programme “First Stars”....Pages 31-35
The Contribution of UVES@VLT to the New Era of QSO Absorption Line Studies....Pages 37-42
IMAGES: A Unique View of the Galaxy Mass Assembly Since z=1....Pages 43-47
The Metallicity Evolution at High Redshift....Pages 49-53
Near-IR Spectroscopy of Blue Supergiants....Pages 55-60
Integral Field Spectroscopy of Protoplanetary Disks in Orion with VLT FLAMES....Pages 61-65
MAD@VLT: Deep into the Madding Crowd of Omega Centauri....Pages 67-71
Chemical Evolution of the Galaxy and Supernova Yields after UVES....Pages 73-77
Front Matter....Pages 79-79
VLTI Science Highlights....Pages 81-87
MIDI Sees Active Galactic Nuclei....Pages 89-93
The Use of the VLTI for Studying the Asymmetric Mass Loss of Evolved Stars....Pages 95-99
Mid-infrared Interferometric Observations of Young Circumstellar Discs....Pages 101-105
Resolving the Inner Active Accretion Disk Around the Herbig Be Star MWC 147 with VLTI/MIDI?+?AMBER Spectro-interferometry....Pages 107-111
Multi-epoch VLTI/MIDI Observations of the Carbon-rich Mira Star V Oph....Pages 113-118
Front Matter....Pages 119-123
A Mid-infrared Interferometric Study of the Circumstellar Environment of Dusty OH/IR Stars with VLTI/MIDI....Pages 79-79
The Closest Dusty Cloud Ever Detected Around a R CrB Variable Star Using the VLTI/MIDI Instrument....Pages 125-126
Front Matter....Pages 127-129
A Twenty Year Science Vision for European Astronomy....Pages 131-131
Baryonic Acoustic Oscillations....Pages 133-139
Galaxy Formation and Evolution....Pages 141-145
Exoplanets: The Road to Earth Twins....Pages 147-153
Next Generation Deep Redshift Surveys with the VLT....Pages 155-162
GUAIX: The UCM Group of Extragalactic Astrophysics and Astronomical Instrumentation....Pages 163-168
VISTA Public Surveys and VLT followup....Pages 169-170
Probing Dark Energy with Cosmological Redshift Surveys at the VLT....Pages 171-175
The First Galaxies and Galaxy Clusters....Pages 177-181
Narrow Band Surveys and the Epoch of Reionization....Pages 183-185
Stellar Archaeology and Galaxy Genesis: The Need for Large Area Multi-Object Spectrograph on 8 m-Class Telescopes....Pages 187-191
Near-field Cosmology with the VLT....Pages 193-197
Chemical Evolution of Local Group Galaxies....Pages 199-203
The VLTI as a Tool to Study Eclipsing Binaries for an Improved Distance Scale....Pages 205-209
Front Matter....Pages 211-213
Status of the European ELT....Pages 215-215
The Science Case for the European ELT....Pages 217-223
GRB Afterglows in the ELT Era....Pages 225-232
On the Way to an E-ELT Instrumentation Plan....Pages 233-234
Front Matter....Pages 235-242
From ESPRESSO to CODEX....Pages 215-215
First Results of AQuEye, a Precursor ‘Quantum’ Instrument for the E-ELT....Pages 243-247
The E-ELT: A Chance to Measure Cosmic Magnetic Fields....Pages 249-253
The Experience from VISIR and the Design of an ELT Mid-infrared Instrument....Pages 255-259
HARMONI: A Narrow Field Near-infrared Integral Field Spectrograph for the E-ELT....Pages 261-265
Which Synergies Between LBT/LINC Nirvana and Future ELTs?....Pages 267-271
TMT Science and Instruments....Pages 273-277
Front Matter....Pages 279-285
The Atacama Large Millimeter/Submillimeter Array....Pages 287-287
Observational Cosmology with the ELT and JWST....Pages 289-294
Integral Field Spectroscopy of (U)LIRGs. From VLT to JWST....Pages 295-299
Front Matter....Pages 301-305
VLT and VLTI Second Generation Instrument Overview and Resources....Pages 307-307
HAWK-I and Infrared Imaging on the VLT....Pages 309-313
X-Shooter: A Medium-resolution, Wide-Band Spectrograph for the VLT....Pages 315-318
KMOS and KMOS++....Pages 319-324
New Science Opportunities Offered by MUSE....Pages 325-329
SPHERE: A ‘Planet Finder’ Instrument for the VLT....Pages 331-336
Milli-arcsecond Astrophysics with VSI, the VLTI Spectro-imager in the ELT Era....Pages 337-341
Prospects for Near-infrared Characterisation of Hot Jupiters with the VLTI Spectro-imager (VSI)....Pages 343-348
MATISSE....Pages 349-351
MATISSE Science Cases....Pages 353-357
Front Matter....Pages 359-360
GRAVITY: Microarcsecond Astrometry and Deep Interferometric Imaging with the VLT....Pages 307-307
Front Matter....Pages 361-365
Smart Focal Plane Technologies for VLT Instruments....Pages 367-367
Applications of Digital Micromirror Devices to Astronomical Instrumentation....Pages 369-373
FORS in the Era of Second Generation VLT Instrumentation....Pages 375-376
Wide Field Options on the VLT....Pages 377-378
A Few Degrees Very Wide Field of View Camera for VLT as a Finder for ELT....Pages 379-384
Science with a 16 m VLT: The Case for Variability of Fundamental Constants....Pages 385-388
ESPRESSO: A High Resolution Spectrograph for the Combined Coud? Focus of the VLT....Pages 389-393
Feeding Optics for the ESPRESSO Spectrograph....Pages 395-399
New Design Approach for a Very-High Resolution Spectrograph for the VLT Combined Focus....Pages 401-402
ESPRESSO Optomechanics....Pages 403-404
ESPRESSO Science Software....Pages 405-407
High Resolution Wavelength Calibration: Advancements with the Laser Frequency Comb Development....Pages 409-410
Precision Radial Velocities in the Infrared....Pages 411-413
Very Large Spectroscopic Surveys with the VLT....Pages 415-416
New Developments in Integral Field Spectroscopy....Pages 417-421
ULTRAPHOT....Pages 423-427
Super-GIRAFFE: The Next Generation High Multiplex Optical Spectrograph with d-IFUs....Pages 429-430
FLEX (The First Light Explorer)—The Science Case for a Fully OH Suppressed IFU Spectrograph....Pages 431-435
An N-Band Integral Field Spectrometer Survey Instrument for the VLT....Pages 437-441
Front Matter....Pages 443-447
High Resolution Visible Imaging on the VLT....Pages 367-367
Life on the Fast Lane: The Burst Mode at the VLT at Present and in the Future....Pages 449-453
High Resolution Near Infrared Spectroscopy: Prospects for 10 and 40 m Class Telescopes....Pages 455-459
Prospects and Needs of Micro-arcsecond Astrometry....Pages 461-468
CASIS: Cassegrain Adaptive-Optics Simultaneous Imaging System for the VLT....Pages 469-473
The Need for a General Purpose Diffraction Limited Imager at the VLT....Pages 475-479
Exploring the Time Axis—High Resolution Timing Observations with Present and Future Instrumentation....Pages 481-485
Advanced Calibration for Quantitative Astrophysics: 2nd Generation VLT Instruments and Beyond....Pages 487-491
Quantitative Near-IR Spectroscopy of OB Stars....Pages 493-498
The Very Large Telescope Interferometer in the ELT Era....Pages 499-500
VLTI and Beyond: The Next Steps in AGN Research with Interferometers....Pages 501-506
....Pages 507-512