CELESTE: A large heliostat array for gamma ray astronomy

Breakthroughs in high energy gamma ray astronomy both on the ground and in space since circa 1990 sparked campaigns to extend the sensitivity of the atmospheric Cherenkov detectors down to the energy range of the satellite detectors. While the Cherenkov imagers have yielded the best results near 1 TeV, we argue that wavefront sampling is better suited to begin exploration of the sub-100 GeV range. Specifically, we describe work that has been done on Celeste , a project to transform the Themis central receiver solar power plant in the French Pyrenees into a 20 GeV to 200 GeV gamma ray telescope. Celeste will complement the 200 GeV to 20 TeV instruments already running at Themis.