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Serendipitous and targeted mm/sub-mm transient searches with wide-FOV telescope

Karri Koljonen, Claudio Ricci, Thomas Stanke, Doug Johnstone, Atul Mohan, Francisco Montenegro-Montes, John Orlowski-Scherer

TL;DR

Addressing the gap in mm/sub-mm time-domain astronomy, the paper advocates a next-generation wide-field, large-aperture mm/sub-mm telescope to enable serendipitous discovery and rapid multi-messenger follow-up. It argues that a facility with degree-scale FOV, high sensitivity, and rapid slewing would probe jet launching, relativistic shocks, and obscured transients across Galactic and extragalactic environments. The authors outline a strong science case, articulate the required capabilities (multi-band coverage, polarization, fast triggering, and real-time pipelines), and emphasize the long-term legacy value of mm/sub-mm variability datasets into the 2040s.

Abstract

The millimeter/sub-millimeter (mm/sub-mm) sky remains a rich but under-explored frontier for transient and variable phenomena. A wide-field, high-sensitivity instrument with a large aperture and degree-scale field of view would open this regime, enabling both systematic survey monitoring and rapid-response follow-up. Key science opportunities include Galactic Plane monitoring and surveys to discover and characterize time-variable emission from young stellar objects, magnetically active and flaring stars, compact binaries, and explosive events, as well as prompt responses to multi-messenger alerts with large localization regions (e.g., gravitational-wave triggers). Multi-band capability, rapid slewing, and high sensitivity are essential to probe energetic processes such as jet launching, relativistic shocks and accretion flows in unprecedented detail. While long-term monitoring is well established at radio and optical/infrared wavelengths, mm/sub-mm observations uniquely bridge the spectral gap between these regimes, directly probing obscured environments that are inaccessible elsewhere. Large-scale monitoring programs will yield legacy datasets crucial for population studies through the 2040s and beyond.

Serendipitous and targeted mm/sub-mm transient searches with wide-FOV telescope

TL;DR

Addressing the gap in mm/sub-mm time-domain astronomy, the paper advocates a next-generation wide-field, large-aperture mm/sub-mm telescope to enable serendipitous discovery and rapid multi-messenger follow-up. It argues that a facility with degree-scale FOV, high sensitivity, and rapid slewing would probe jet launching, relativistic shocks, and obscured transients across Galactic and extragalactic environments. The authors outline a strong science case, articulate the required capabilities (multi-band coverage, polarization, fast triggering, and real-time pipelines), and emphasize the long-term legacy value of mm/sub-mm variability datasets into the 2040s.

Abstract

The millimeter/sub-millimeter (mm/sub-mm) sky remains a rich but under-explored frontier for transient and variable phenomena. A wide-field, high-sensitivity instrument with a large aperture and degree-scale field of view would open this regime, enabling both systematic survey monitoring and rapid-response follow-up. Key science opportunities include Galactic Plane monitoring and surveys to discover and characterize time-variable emission from young stellar objects, magnetically active and flaring stars, compact binaries, and explosive events, as well as prompt responses to multi-messenger alerts with large localization regions (e.g., gravitational-wave triggers). Multi-band capability, rapid slewing, and high sensitivity are essential to probe energetic processes such as jet launching, relativistic shocks and accretion flows in unprecedented detail. While long-term monitoring is well established at radio and optical/infrared wavelengths, mm/sub-mm observations uniquely bridge the spectral gap between these regimes, directly probing obscured environments that are inaccessible elsewhere. Large-scale monitoring programs will yield legacy datasets crucial for population studies through the 2040s and beyond.

Paper Structure

This paper contains 3 sections, 3 figures.

Table of Contents

  1. Scientific context and motivation
  2. Science case
  3. Technical requirements

Figures (3)

  • Figure 1:
  • Figure 1: Example of mapping GW sky localization regions. The figure shows LIGO/Virgo event GW170608 from GWTC-1, with circular 2-degree-diameter telescope footprints optimized for highest-probability coverage. 44 fields covering 64 deg$^2$ capture 40% of the probability region, mapped with $\sim$0.1 mJy/beam sensitivity in 3 hours (Band 3; 91.5 GHz central frequency, 51 GHz bandwidth, 10 s per field). Observations progress from the highest- to lowest-probability areas with $\sim$2 deg/s slews.
  • Figure 2: Reverse shock models at 100 GHz for the GRB jets Eftekhari2022. Solid and dashed lines correspond to initial Lorentz factors of $\Gamma$ = 200 and 50, respectively. Thin lines correspond to the forward shock component which peaks at later times.