| BLAST is a balloon-borne large-aperture, submillimetre telescope, which makes large area (1--200 square degree) surveys of Galactic and extragalactic targets. Since BLAST observes in the stratosphere, it is able to make broad-band observations between 200 mum and 550 mum which are difficult or impossible to perform from the ground. BLAST has been designed to probe star formation both in the local Galaxy and in the high redshift (z = 1--4) universe.;BLAST has been flown on two long-duration balloon flights. The first of these, from Esrange, Sweden in June of 2005, acquired ∼70 hours of primarily Galactic data. During the second flight, from Willy Field, Antarctica in December of 2006, BLAST acquired ∼225 hours of both Galactic and extragalactic data. Operational performance of the platform during these two flights is reviewed, with the goal of providing insight on how future flights can be improved.;Reduction of the data acquired by these large-format bolometer arrays is a challenging procedure, and techniques developed for BLAST data reduction are reviewed. The ultimate goal of this reduction is the generation of high quality astronomical maps which can be used for subsequent portions of data analysis.;This thesis treats, in detail, the iterative, maximum likelihood map maker developed for BLAST. Results of simulations performed on the map maker to characterise its ability to reconstruct astronomical signals are presented. Finally, astronomical maps produced by this map maker using real data acquired by BLAST are presented, with a discussion on non-physical map pathologies resulting from the data reduction pipeline and map making procedures.;Because BLAST is flown on an unmanned stratospheric balloon platform, it has been designed to be able to operate autonomously, without needing operator intervention to perform its scientific goals. This thesis includes an overview of the design of the BLAST platform, with emphasis on the command and control systems used to operate the telescope. |
