It is now evident that the exceptional seeing at Dome C will
allow, in the next years, to pursue astronomical programs with
conditions better than at any other observatory in the world, and
very close to space experiments.
Considering a new type of wide-field telescope, particular
astronomical programs could be well optimized for observations at
Dome C such as surveys for the discovery and follow up of
near-Earth asteroids, search for extra-solar planets using transit
or micro-lensing events, and stellar luminosity variations.
We propose to build a 1.5–2 m class three-reflections telescope, with
1–1.5 degree FOV, four times shorter than an equivalent Schmidt
telescope, and providing a flat field without requiring a
triplet- or quadruplet-lens corrector since its design is
anastigmatic.
We present the preliminary optical tests of such designs:
MINITRUST 1 and 2 are two 45 cm identical prototypes based in
France and Italy, and manufactured using active optics techniques.