Site-testing at Muztagh-ata site I: Ground Meteorology and Sky Brightness

• Published in: arXiv.org
• Main Authors: Xu, Jing, Esamdin, Ali, Jin-xin, Hao, Jin-min, Bai, Yang, Ji, Zhou, Xu, Yong-qiang, Yao, Jin-liang, Hou, Guang-xin Pu, Guo-jie, Feng, Chun-hai Bai, Peng, Wei, Shu-guo, Ma, Yisikandee, Abudusaimaitijiang, Le-tian, Wang, Zhang, Xuan, Liang, Ming, Lu, Ma, Jin-zhong, Liu, Zi-huang, Cao, Yong-heng, Zhao, Lu, Feng, Jian-rong Shi, Hua-lin, Chen, Chong, Pei, Xiao-jun, Jiang, Jian-feng, Wang, Jian-feng, Tian, Yan-jie, Xue, Jing-yao, Hu, Yun-ying, Jiang
• Format: Paper Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Ithaca Cornell University Library, arXiv.org 31.03.2020
• Subjects: Air temperature; Atmospheric pressure; Automatic weather stations; Infrared telescopes; Meteorology; Physics - Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics; Relative humidity; Sky brightness; Statistical analysis; Wind speed
• ISSN: 2331-8422
• DOI: 10.48550/arxiv.2003.14079

Site-testing is crucial for achieving the goal of scientific research and analysis of meteorological and optical observing conditions is one of the basic tasks of it. As one of three potential sites to host 12-meter Large Optical/infrared Telescope (LOT), Muztagh-ata site which is located on the Pamirs Plateau in west China's Xinjiang began its site-testing task in the spring of 2017. In this paper, we firstly start with an introduction to the site and then present a statistical analysis of the ground-level meteorological properties such as air temperature, barometric pressure, relative humidity, wind speed and direction, recorded by automatic weather station with standard meteorological sensors for two-year long. We also show the monitoring results of sky brightness during this period.