Agile: A Time-series CCD Photometer To Observe Blue Variables

Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astronomy

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Scientific paper

We use differential time-series photometry to study phenomena variable at short timescales. A good time-series photometer not only requires an accurate measurement of the start time of an exposure, but also the exposure duration. Elements that cause a jitter in these measurements are undesirable, such as an undisciplined clock used for timing, a mechanical shutter, and an unregulated time-share data acquisition system. Besides accuracy in timing, a good time-series photometer must be able to provide sufficient time resolution to sample the variable phenomena well. This requires that the photometer allow a short exposure time and also introduce an insignificant dead time between consecutive exposures. Frame transfer CCDs are ideal for time-series photometry as they can provide back-to-back exposures with no dead time.
We have assembled a time-series photometer called Agile, optimized to observe the rapid oscillations of blue variables such as pulsating white dwarfs and subdwarfs, cataclysmic variables, and flare stars. Agile is based on the design of a time-series photometer called Argos at McDonald Observatory (Nather & Mukadam 2004), and utilizes a commercial frame transfer CCD camera from Princeton Instruments with 1024x1024 active pixels. This instrument mounts at the Nasmyth focus of the 3.5m telescope at Apache Point Observatory, where we expect a field-of-view of 2.6x2.6 arcmin and a platescale of 0.15 arcsec/pixel using a focal reducer. We use a GPS-based programmable timer card to generate pulses that initiate frame transfer in the CCD camera, giving us complete control over both the exposure start time and its duration to high precision. We expect to read an unbinned full frame in 1.1s using a low noise amplifier operating at 1MHz with a read noise of order <8 electrons RMS. The CCD is back-illuminated and thinned for improved blue sensitivity and provides a quantum efficiency >80% in the wavelength range 4500-7500A.

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