Llano de Chajnantor

Llano de Chajnantor is located at 5104 m altitude in the Chilean Atacama desert. It is a very dry site - inhospitable to humans - but an excellent site for submm astronomy. Water vapor absorbs and attenuates submm radiation and thus a dry site is required for high-frequency radio astronomy.

Llano de Chajnantor is one of the best sites available on Earth - and also the selected site for the future ALMA project - a collaboration between Europe and the US to construct and operate 64 antennas for high sensitvity, high frequency imaging of the southern sky.

Geographic Latitude : 23º 00' 20.8" South

Elevation : 5104m