THz/Far-IR Astrophysical Studies at the Australian Synchrotron

THz synchrotron spectroscopy has become an important tool in the identification and quantification of molecular species of astrophysical interest; it is a routinely used technique as it is well established that synchrotron radiation offers a S/N advantage over conventional thermal sources. The brightness advantage is perfectly suited for high-resolution gas-phase spectroscopy, and at the Australian Synchrotron, this advantage is limited to energies lying below 1500 cm^-1; however, a flux advantage is maintained for energies below 350 cm^-1 which facilitates the study of homogeneous condensed-phase samples. The THz/Far-IR beamline is equipped with a suite of both gas-phase and condensed-phase techniques to enable research on interstellar molecular species, and in this paper, the beamline capabilities available for the study of molecular species of astrophysical interest will be presented.