Rationale

The Milky Way is one of many spiral galaxies that exist in the Universe. The importance of the Milky Way is that we are located in that band of stars, also called the Plane of the Galaxy. We have the chance of learning much more of it than other galaxies. We have learned that, in the spiral arms of the Milky Way and, in fact, throughout our whole Galaxy, there is a magnetic field. This field influences how stars form and, ultimately, how our Galaxy will evolve. It also influences how stars like our Sun form disks around them; our Solar System planets were formed within such disks, for instance.

Analyzing the light that we receive from stars, close or far away, we can get clues about the magnetic field that pervades the Galaxy. We do that observing starlight through some optics that tells us how the starlight vibrates. This is similar to using a polarizer sun glass. When sunlight hits the asphalt on the road, the scattered light that comes our direction vibrates roughly parallel to the pavement. Using sun glasses that have a Polaroid film oriented vertically, the glasses cut the reflections of the pavement and provide a clearer view for the driver.
Polarized light is all around Nature. Consider the blue sky on a cloudless day, for instance. Such sky is blue because sunlight is scattered by the molecules in the atmosphere. This blue light is polarized and here comes an incredibly important fact: bees use this polarized light in the blue sky to direct their mates to flowers that carry pollen. Bees are important pollinators that allow fruits and our food to grow. Bees and polarized light are hence fundamental to our own existence as humans!
In order to study the magnetic field or our Galaxy, as well as that in the nearby Magellanic Clouds and other galaxies, the SOUTH POL team is designing and building a very accurate polarimeter which will be installed in the 1 meter Telescope that was recently purchased and will be installed in Pico dos Dias Observatory managed by LNA. LNA and the SOUTH POL team will also implement the data reduction pipeline and web-based access to the database.
SOUTH POL will be an original, unprecedented undertaking in Astronomy. Such survey has been called the last big astronomical survey that still remains to be done. Initially, it will cover the sky south of declination -15° in two to three years of observing time. The SOUTH POL survey will provide Astrophysics with an unparalleled, highly valuable database. The data will have an immediate impact in several areas, such as Cosmology, Extragalactic Astronomy, Interstellar Medium of the Galaxy and Magellanic Clouds, Star Formation, Stellar Envelopes, Stellar explosions (GRBs, novae and supernovae) and Solar System, among others. SOUTH POL will steadily progress to both more northerly declinations and additional epochs.
More detailed, deeper programs with the polarimeter in the future will additionally contribute to tackle more specific scientific problems in the areas above and other areas.

The SOUTH POL team has members from  the following institutions:

• National Laboratory for Astrophysics - MCTI, Brazil;

• Dept. of Astronomy, IAG - University of São Paulo, Brazil;

• Dept. of Astrophysics - Radboud University, The Netherlands;

• Universidade Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden;

• Astrophysics Division - National Institute for Space Research (INPE) - MCTI, Brazil;

• Hiroshima Astrophysical Science Center, Hiroshima University - Japan;

• Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, The University of Tokyo - Japan.

• Universidade Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden

We are also thankful to the following funding agencies:

• Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico - CNPq - Brazil;

• Dutch Research Council - NWO - The Netherlands;

• European Research Council - ERC - Europe;

• Financiadora de Estudos e Projetos - FINEP - Brazil;

• Fundação de Apoio à Pesquisa no Estado de São Paulo - FAPESP - Brazil;

• Fundação de Pesquisa e Assessoramento à Indústria - FUPAI - Brazil;

• The Mitsubishi Foundation - Japan.