Four-shooter: a large format charge-coupled-device camera for the Hale telescope
Abstract
We describe an astronomical camera for the 200-in. Hale telescope using four 800 X800 Texas Instruments CCDs in an optical arrangement that allows imaging of a contiguous 1600-pixel-square region of sky. The system employs reimaging optics to yield a scale of 0.33 arcsec per pixel, a good match to the best seeing conditions at Palomar Observatory. Modern high-efficiency coatings are used in the complex optical system to yield a throughput at peak efficiency of nearly 50% (including the losses in the telescope), corresponding to a quantum efficiency on the sky of about 30%. The system uses a fifth CCD in a spectroscopic channel, and it is possible to obtain simultaneous imaging and spectroscopic observations with the system. The camera may also be used in a scanning mode, in which the telescope tracking rate is offset, and the charge is clocked in the chips in such a manner as to keep the charge image aligned with the optical image. In this way, a survey for high-redshift quasars has been carried out over a large area of sky. The instrument has produced images for the most distant clusters of galaxies yet discovered as well as spectra of the most distant galaxies yet observed.
Additional Information
© 1987 Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers. Invited Paper CC-111 received Jan. 21, 1987; revised manuscript received Feb. 1, 1987; accepted for publication March 30, 1987; received by Managing Editor April 17, 1987. It would be remiss at this point not to thank Morley Blouke, without whom there would be no CCDs of the quality of the devices discussed here, and Jim Janesick, without whom we would not understand them even if we had them. We have merely made a very fancy box in which to mount the magic detectors, and the 1500 pounds of steel and glass would not be very useful without a crucial 10 mg of silicon. The construction of the instrument was made possible by grants from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and the National Science Foundation.Attached Files
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- Eprint ID
- 54177
- Resolver ID
- CaltechAUTHORS:20150128-100524971
- NASA
- NSF
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2015-01-28Created from EPrint's datestamp field
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2021-11-10Created from EPrint's last_modified field