Technical Article

The Tor Vergata Synoptic Solar Telescope (TSST): A robotic, compact facility for solar full disk imaging

¹ Department of Physics, University of Rome Tor Vergata, 00133 Roma, Italy
² INAF – Astronomical Observatory of Rome, 00078 Roma, Italy
³ INFN-GSGC L’Aquila and DSFC University of L’Aquila, 67100 L’Aquila, Italy
⁴ INFN-GSGC L’Aquila and CETEMPS-DSFC University of L’Aquila, 67100 L’Aquila, Italy
⁵ Department of Physics and Astronomy, Georgia State University, Atlanta, 30303 GA, USA
⁶ INAF – Capodimonte Astronomical Observatory, 80131 Napoli, Italy
⁷ Jet Propulsion Laboratory – NASA, Pasadena, 91109 CA, USA

^* Corresponding author: francesco.berrilli@roma2.infn.it

Received: 15 June 2020
Accepted: 12 October 2020

Abstract

By the continuous multi-line observation of the solar atmosphere, it is possible to infer the magnetic and dynamical status of the Sun. This activity is essential to identify the possible precursors of space weather events, such as flare or coronal mass ejections. We describe the design and assembly of TSST (Tor Vergata Synoptic Solar Telescope), a robotic synoptic telescope currently composed of two main full-disk instruments, a Hα telescope and a Potassium (KI D1) magneto-optical filter (MOF)-based telescope operating at 769.9 nm. TSST is designed to be later upgraded with a second MOF channel. This paper describes the TSST concepts and presents the first light observation carried out in February 2020. We show that TSST is a low-cost robotic facility able to achieve the necessary data for the study of precursors of space weather events (using the magnetic and velocity maps by the MOF telescope) and fast flare detection (by the Hα telescope) to support Space Weather investigation and services.