Tenerife Experiment

The Tenerife Experiment was a Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) experiment built by Jodrell Bank of the University of Manchester and in collaboration with the Instituto de Astrofisica de Canarias (IAC). It was installed and run at the Observatorio del Teide in Tenerife in 1984, and ran with various upgrades and additional experiments until 2000.

Tenerife Experiment

Part of	Teide Observatory
Location(s)	Spain
Organization	Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias Jodrell Bank Observatory
Wavelength	10, 15, 33 GHz (3.00, 2.00, 0.91 cm)
First light	1984
Decommissioned	2000
Telescope style	cosmic microwave background experiment Dicke radiometer radio telescope
Website	www.iac.es/proyecto/cmb/pages/en/former-cmb-experiments/the-tenerife-experiment.php

It measured anisotropy of the CMB on angular sizes of 5 degrees, about the size of the upper half of the constellation of Orion (from the "belt" to the "shoulders"). To reduce receiver instability, it performed fast Dicke Switching between two horns separated by 8 degrees. To remove long term drifts and atmospheric variations, it used a further switch of 8 degrees using a flat mirror in front of the horns.