Partial support is being provided for the detailed design of a long-baseline, multiple-telescope interferometer array operating at visible wavelengths. This award follows a four-year feasibility and design concept effort. A cooperative venture between Georgia State University's Center for High Angular Resolution Astronomy (CHARA) and the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) of the Georgia Institute of Technology, the CHARA Array will consist of seven 1-m aperture telescopes in a VLA-type configuration contained within a circle of 400 m diameter. The Array will provide a limiting resolution of 0.2 milliarcsec. The primary scientific program will be directed at the fundamental astrophysics of single and multiple stars, but the Array will be applicable to problems in all areas of contemporary astronomy. A significant fraction of observing time will be open to the U.S. astronomical community with an emphasis on developing methods for very high resolution imaging of broad classes of extended objects. Thus the CHARA Array will serve as a prototype for next-generation imaging arrays built as national facilities on the ground and in space.
