Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astrophysics
Scientific paper
2006-06-07
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Astrophysics
11 pages, 5 figures, presented at SPIE Astronomical Telescopes and Instrumentation, 24 - 31 May 2006, Orlando, Florida USA
Scientific paper
10.1117/12.673537
We describe a new concept for a MEMS-based active spatial filter for astronomical spectroscopy. The goal of this device is to allow the use of a diffraction-limited spectrometer on a seeing limited observation at improved throughput over a comparable seeing-limited spectrometer, thus reducing the size and cost of the spectrometer by a factor proportional to r0/D (For the case of a 10 meter telescope this size reduction will be approximately a factor of 25 to 50). We use a fiber-based integral field unit (IFU) that incorporates an active MEMS mirror array to feed an astronomical spectrograph. A fast camera is used in parallel to sense speckle images at a spatial resolution of lambda/D and at a temporal frequency greater than that of atmospheric fluctuations. The MEMS mirror-array is used as an active shutter to feed speckle images above a preset intensity threshold to the spectrometer, thereby increasing the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of the spectrogram. Preliminary calculations suggests an SNR improvement of a factor of about 1.4. Computer simulations have shown an SNR improvement of 1.1, but have not yet fully explored the parameter space.
Kuhlen M. Q.
Nigra Lou
Sheinis Andrew I.
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