Kitt Peak National Observatory Status and Plans

Richard F. Green

Tucson, AZ 23 October, 2003

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Outline I. Instrumentation Partnerships

A. U. of Maryland - NEWFIRM

B. STScI / GSFC - IRMOS

C. Penn State - Exoplanet Tracker (ET)

D. U. of Florida - continuation of FLAMINGOS

E. WIYN - 0.9m - Provision of Mosaic

II. WIYN Strategic PlanA. One-Degree Imager

B. Upgraded wide-field spectroscopy

C. Tip/Tilt Module + NIR Camera

III. Longer-Term Goals - What best serves community interests?

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Fulfilling the New NSF Cooperative Agreement

3. Provide through the staff & facilities of NOAO the support necessary for conduct of research in the relevant disciplines, assuring that the primary criterion for the utilization of facilities be scientific merit of the proposed research, as judged thru appropriate merit review mechanisms.

5.  Develop new instruments, techniques, and software for astronomical observations, data analysis, and data utilization which exploit existing NOAO telescopes.

7. Implement appropriate partnerships with US universities and non-Federal observatories to maximize the observational capabilities available to the entire community

Heritage of Intended U. Maryland Partnership

• Users Committee recommendation, 9 December, 1995:“There is a clear need for the capacity to carry out sensitive, large-scale IR surveys

which in turn will allow for the full utilization of the IR capabilities of Gemini.”“As stressed above, we see wide-field IR imaging as a priority for NOAO that is

currently not being met.”• In FY95, KPNO received $6.77M in new funds from NSF, 22% of

the NOAO budget, and ~$8.3M in today’s dollars. In FY03, KPNO received $3.74M in new funds, 15% of the NOAO budget.

• Users Committee recommendation, 2 May, 2001:“In addition, the Committee recommends that NOAO openly and fully exploit the

development of novel, state-of-the-art instrumentation by private and public institutions and laboratories.”

“To this end, we encourage NOAO management to consider expanding current partnering arrangements that trade blocks of observing time for instrument access and instrument support.”

“At the same time, the Committee requests that NOAO clearly articulate a process and guidelines for implementing partnership arrangements. The amount of telescope access that might be granted for an instrument should be stated and the commitments from interested parties and the general user community clarified.”

KPNO Priorities: 4K x 4K NEWFIRM

– Planned initially as internal NOAO project

– Instrument to be shared between KPNO and CTIO – complemented by continuing access to FLAMINGOS

– Status: Non-advocate PDR June 4 & 5. Science in 2005.

– Detector foundry run supported through FY03 supplemental funding.

– NOAO internal allocation required supplementary support for manpower and capital.

Invitation to Partnership in NEWFIRM or Externally Supplied Instrument

• The opportunity to propose for partnership was advertised through several means– The March, 2002 NOAO Newsletter– Handouts at the January, 2002 AAS meeting– A highlighted item on the main NOAO web page for several months– The KPNO Director personally contacted all the institutions which had ever

expressed interest in an opportunity for partnership.

• The process was reviewed, revised and approved.– The AURA Observatories Council reviewed the issue at least twice. – The first time in December, 2001, they agreed in principle to a partnership and

made suggestions for the best ways to broadcast the opportunity to the community, all of which we followed.

– The second time they approved our approach of a largely external review committee, and delegated the responsibility for picking the winner to NOAO.

Implementation - 2

• One proposal was received for partnering, from the University of Maryland.

• A (largely) external review committee was convened to evaluate the proposal.

• They provided a report, stating that the Maryland Astronomy Department was a suitable partner, and that they requested a Phase 2 proposal with more detail to be assured that the community received adequate value and that the partnership management structure would assure success.

• They reviewed the Phase 2 proposal, with a recommendation to the KPNO Director to proceed to negotiate the terms of the partnership.

U. of Maryland Partnership

• $450K / yr in cash and in kind, in exchange for 20% of the scheduled 4-m time.• Encouraged to exchange for WIYN nights 1:1 and 2.1-m nights 4:1.• 3-yr terms, renewable by mutual consent, beginning with Semester 2003B.• In-kind contribution is two programming staff + 1 data aide, fully integrated into

NOAO Data Products Program pipeline development team, plus support of U MD collaboration expenses.

• Time allocation process similar to integration of Chilean TAC results into CTIO block scheduling.

• Oversight provided by “Board” of 3 U.MD + 3 NOAO, who meet semi-annually.• The first major joint project is NEWFIRM; capital for the instrument and

production of the data pipeline.• Prototype data pipeline to be developed for FLAMINGOS reductions.• With Maryland nights included, the oversubscription rates on the Mayall 4-m and

WIYN will be in the range of 2-4:1, consistent with that for other NSF resources, such as the grants program

• Current status: NOAO & U MD agreed on these terms; NSF AST requests Users Committee comment before endorsing.

Your Advice Valued on the Following Questions:

• Given the financial stringency of current observatory support, does the U. MD partnership prospect represent a responsible approach to providing competitive instrumentation to users?

• What is a scientifically effective cadence for sharing NEWFIRM between KPNO and CTIO (6 mo - 2 yr), taking into consideration that KPNO observers may contribute 20% of their time to its development?

• What approach to planning maximum scientific impact of the instrument should we take? Should we rely strictly on market forces and the existing survey program, or should we consider planning workshops, means to consolidate programs that can share data, etc.?

Programmable multi-slit mask from digital multi-mirror array - demonstrated good performance at 70K

Feeds Rockwell Hawaii-1 (1Kx1K) HgCdTe array

F/15 reimaging -> 0.25”/micro-mirror for 160”x120” FOV

Measurements demonstrating contrast (background rejection) close to 1000.

Integration delays -> first light commissioning in Spring ‘04

PI (MacKenty & Greenhouse) time for initial science; further guarantees dependent on community interest?

B. IRMOS

C. Penn State Exoplanet Tracker

– Fiber-fed bench spectrograph with iodine reference; moire pattern from Michelson interferometer projected onto widened stellar spectrum for phase sensitivity.

– Run with prototype at 2.1-m confirmed planet, 11 m/s day-to-day stability.

– Anticipate throughput sufficient to monitor 8th - 9th mag on 2.1-m.

– Funded by NSF instrumentation grant– PI Jian Ge will make available as a

user instrument, including reduction software and hardware support.

– Ge and team would like 21, 14+match, 14+match nights on the 2.1-m for the first 3 semesters, then match to user demand after that.

– Is the price right? (Should he come on down?)

D. FLAMINGOS

– PI Elston is interested in continuing to base the instrument at Kitt Peak. Are we agreeable?

– Note that no DD time was ever required to meet the minimum guaranteed time (beyond the T&E night beginning each block). All was granted through TAC-approved, highly ranked proposals.

– Recent improvements have greatly reduced bad reads and the scrambled data in final lines.

– KPNO proposers starting to use multi-slits at the 4-m.

– Future option - 23-slice IFU for 30”x13” FOV with 0.6” sampling.

– (The image is a JHK composite of IC 348, with the single pointing FOV at the 2.1-m.)

E. Mosaic at WIYN 0.9-m

– KPNO provides Mosaic (+S2KB) to the WIYN 0.9-m Consortium in exchange for 40% of the Mosaic time.

– This semester, Mosaic is on the WIYN 0.9-m for 3 dark runs + associated bright time.

– The Consortium agreement is up for renewal next July; proposal is for a 5-year term.

– NOAO scientific staff on balance favorable - typical proposal getting time ranked by TAC comparably to average 2.1-m science.

– Technical staff finds no difficulties with transfers from the 4-m, and prefers maintenance of the instrument on the 0.9-m.

– Should we renew this agreement?

II. WIYN Strategic Plan

– Develop ODI, maintain forefront telescope performance, and build on the strength of wide-field spectroscopy. (Strongly endorsed by the previous Users committee)

– Enhance the impact of WIYN science through supporting collaborations, creative scheduling for time domain science.

– Encourage the partners to develop technical capabilities.

– Explore Consortium access to larger telescope facilities (largely a university partner priority).

– Given that NOAO is in a public/private partnership, are you comfortable with these strategic directions for the Consortium?

One-Degree Imager

– Current status: First foundry run of Orthogonal Transfer CCD arrays about to begin. Architecture developed by STA (Bredthauer) in close collaboration with Barry Burke of MITLL through WIYN / PanSTARRS collaboration. First devices to be tested next Spring.

– NOAO helped fund foundry, and is supplying a Monsoon controller for lab testing.

– Instrument Scientist is George Jacoby.– Proposal submitted for QUOTA (8K x 8K) to

NSF.– WIYN Board authorized spending of instrument

reserve to bring opto-mechanical design to CoDR.

– Aiming for deployment of ODI in 2007.– Institutions are preparing to commit: should

NOAO squeeze to provide its share - $1-1.5M?

Hydra / Bench Upgrade

– Current status: Hydra positioner passed CDR; summer shutdown will see new (maintainable!) rails and drive motors, control electronics and software.

– VPH grating is being mounted for first trials later this year.

– M. Bershady (UW) and C. & D. Harmer have developed a design for an off-axis collimator and field lens group that could afford a 3x increase in throughput (of end fibers) with very small loss of spectral purity.

– Bench upgrade project will proceed subject to successful PDR next Spring.

WTTM + NIR Camera

– Commissioning and scientific verification of WTTM is nearly complete.

– WTTM will yield the best gains in DIQ in the near-IR.

– Margaret Meixner of STScI is interested in building a NIR camera for WTTM, and has some internal funding to do so.

– KPNO owns a second Hawaii 1 array delivered as part of the IRMOS order. It could serve as a “starter” array until funding can be secured for a 2K x 2K.

– An NSF ATI proposal for the camera from Wisconsin got good reviews but no funding.

– Would such a camera be worth supporting by NOAO (e.g., by providing a Monsoon controller)?

Longer-Term Goals

Partnerships can serve to provide major new instruments:NEWFIRM in 2005 (to be shared with CTIO), ODI in 2007.

Is this pace of reinvestment appropriate to maintain competitive facilities?With the “plateau” budget in the NOAO plan, more rapid reinvestment would mean

more partner nights.

What is your thinking on the next major instrument for KPNO, delivery ~2010?NEWFIRM clone

8K x 8K prime focus NIR imager

Mosaic upgrade (new controller + red-hot CCDs?)

Optical spectroscopic upgradeWider field, beam-fed, VPH gratings

Deployable IFUs at WIYN

High resolution (60-70,000) bench spectrograph at WIYN

Multi-object ET

Next generation IR MOS

With 5-year production timescales, it’s not too soon to set the future course.

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