The South Pole Imaging Fabry Perot Interferometer (SPIFI)

Details The South Pole Imaging Fabry Perot Interferometer (SPIFI) The South Pole Imaging Fabry Perot Interferometer (SPIFI)

Dec 1996

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=1996aas...189.7501b&link_type=abstract

American Astronomical Society, 189th AAS Meeting, #75.01; Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, Vol. 28, p.1369

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astronomy

Scientific paper

We present the completed South Pole Imaging Fabry-Perot Interferometer (SPIFI) for use on the AST/RO telescope and the JCMT. SPIFI is a direct-detection spectrometer for use in the far-infrared and submillimeter windows (200, 350, 450, and 600 mu m) accessible at the South Pole and the submillimeter windows available at Mauna Kea. The 25 element (5 x 5) bolometer array is cooled to ~ 100 mK with an adiabatic demagnetization refrigerator, and sees a 300'' field (beam is 55'') and a 35'' field (7'' beam) on the 1.7 m AST/RO telescope and on the 15 m JCMT, respectively. SPIFI's three cryogenic Fabry-Perot interferometers operate in series to achieve spectral resolutions from 300 to 30 km/sec across the entire field of view, while much higher resolution can be achieved on the center pixel. As a direct-detection instrument, SPIFI is significantly more sensitive than the best heterodyne receivers for lines well matched to its spectral resolution. In addition, its spatial multiplexing makes SPIFI an ideal instrument for mapping projects. We hope to use SPIFI at the JCMT by mid-year 1997 and to deploy to the South Pole in November 1997. The scientific goals of SPIFI include the large-scale mapping of the [CI] (370 mu m) and [NII] (205 mu m) fine structure lines, and the CO 7-6 (372 mu m) rotational transition in nearby star formation regions, the Galactic Center, and external galaxies. These lines probe the interaction between young stars and their molecular cloud environs, as well as the internal structure of molecular clouds. In addition, SPIFI on JCMT can detect redshifted [CII] (158 um) emission from bright galaxies at z ~ 1.2, addressing early-epoch star formation.

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