GRAVITY+
Performance upgrade to the GRAVITY instrument and the Very Large Telescope Interferometer
Short Description:
The GRAVITY+ project upgrades GRAVITY and the VLTI in order to open up the extragalactic sky for milliarcsecond-resolution interferometric imaging, and will give access to targets as faint as K = 22 mag. GRAVITY+ measures the black hole masses of active galactic nuclei across cosmic time, and obtains high-quality exoplanet spectra and orbits. GRAVITY+ provides wide-field off-axis fringe tracking, and improved sensitivity and contrast from new natural guide star and laser guide star adaptive optics for all VLT 8 m unit telescopes.
Project Type:
Instrument for ground-based telescope
MPE Contribution:
MPE leads the GRAVITY+ consortium which includes European institutes and ESO.
Status:
Stepwise implementation. As of end 2025, wide field fringe tracking capability, new state of the art adaptive optics, and Laser Guide Stars for UT1-3 already in operation.
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