Development and application of high-precision multifunction astronomical plate digitizers in China

Before charge-coupled device detectors became widely employed in observational astronomy, for more than a hundred years, the main detection method was photography on astronomical glass plates. Recently, in order to preserve these historical data and maintain their usability, the International Astronomical Union has appealed to all countries for global digitization of astronomical plates by developing or adopting advanced digitization technology. Specialized digitizers with high precision and high measuring speed represent key equipment for this task. The Shanghai Astronomical Observatory and the Nishimura Co., Ltd in Japan cooperated between 2013 and 2016 to develop the first Chinese high-precision astronomical plate digitizer, which was then used for complete digitization of all nighttime-observation astronomical plates in China. Then, in 2019–2021, the Shanghai Astronomical Observatory independently developed new models of plate digitizers that enabled countries such as Uzbekistan and Italy to digitize their astronomical plates. Additionally, a new high-precision and multifunction digitizer was also used to digitize valuable microscope slides from the Shanghai Natural History Museum, providing a successful example of cross-domain application of high-precision digitization technology.