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Question
ok NASA i jus want to knw the main puporse for building a south pole telescope? if u are building it in south then why not in north pole?
The simplest answer is that the Antarctic is a very high dry plateau, while the Arctic is an ocean. The Antarctic continent (including the South Pole itself) is a great place for some kinds of infrared astronomy, because of its high altitude and low water vapor, making it one of the driest locations on Earth. The Arctic is one of the worst places for an observatory, since most of it is ocean, and the islands are not high and are much wetter than the Antarctic continent. I have answered this question a couple of times already; you can look this up in the Ask an Astrobiologist archive on this website.
David Morrison, NAI Senior Scientist
April 24, 2008
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