In the Roman era, wide-field, deep, visible-to-near infrared images will revolutionize our understanding of galaxy evolution (e.g. environments, morphologies, masses, colors). The legacy value of Roman images and low-resolution spectra (with Roman’s prism and grism) will be greatly enhanced by massively multiplexed ground-based observations in the near – future and simultaneously allow us to leverage an impressive bounty of archived spectra from Maunakea facilities. We plan to enhance ground-based NIR spectra of astrophysically interesting objects with ground-sky spectra, atmospheric data, HST spectra and images, and machine learning techniques proven to predict galaxy spectra from images.
Maunakea Spectroscopic Explorer (MSE) is the first of the future generation of massively multiplexed spectroscopic facilities. MSE is designed to enable transformative science, being completely dedicated to large-scale multi-object spectroscopic surveys. MSE’s conceptual design includes an 11.25 m aperture telescope which feeds 4,332 fibers over a wide 1.52 square degree field of view. Its spectrographs will have the capabilities to observe at a range of spectral resolutions, from R~3,000 to R~40,000, with all spectral resolutions available at all times and across the entire field. As a dedicated survey facility, MSE must be able to efficiently execute a wide variety of scientific programs at the same time. Here we describe continued planning to execute MSE’s Design Reference Survey, an exercise to plan for and simulate a sample of potential first-generation science programs that exercise the design parameters of the spectroscopic facility.
As the crisis of climate change affects more people every year and leads to more severe weather patterns with unprecedented socio-economical consequence, all actors on the planet need to understand their responsibility and contribute to solving this generational problem. To tackle this issue, individuals and corporations first need to assess their carbon footprint, which then represents the groundwork for the future implementation of significant changes required to reduce that footprint. We present the carbon emissions attributed to the Canada–France–Hawaii Telescope (CFHT) for the year 2019. We partnered with CarbonBuddy and followed their method to break down the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of various activities at CFHT for the entire year of 2019: air travel in and out of state, ground vehicle usage, electricity consumption, and other fossil fuel utilization. The total GHG emissions of CFHT for the year 2019 amount to about 749 tons of CO2 equivalent, which corresponds to more than 16 tons per employee. About 63% of the emissions are related to electricity usage at the summit facility, about 25% to out-of-state travel, about 6% to the use of our fleet of vehicles, and about 5% to electricity usage at headquarters. We show that significant improvements have occurred in the recent past at CFHT, with the installation of solar panels and a remarkable reduction in electricity consumption at headquarters. We list suggestions to further decrease the GHG emissions in the short to long term: offset current emissions by support local projects, invest in more efficient equipment, and establish environmentally friendly habits. The fundamental work presented will facilitate the official planning at CFHT for a drastic reduction in GHG emissions with the goal to meet the objectives laid out in the 2015 Paris Accord. It will also support the design of the Maunakea Spectroscopic Explorer (MSE), the future transformation of CFHT, and allow the project to seize this opportunity and incorporate the fight against climate change as one of its core missions. By choosing to implement those changes, CFHT and MSE can become part of the solution to climate change and lead the way, locally and in the world of astronomy.
Maunakea Spectroscopic Explorer (MSE) is the first of the future generation of massively multiplexed spectroscopic 11.25m mirror facility on a recycled site. MSE is designed to enable transformative science, being completely dedicated to large-scale multi-object spectroscopic surveys, each studying thousands to millions of astrophysical objects. MSE’s transformational potential lies in answering numerous scientific questions and finding new puzzles. Its success will depend in part on its ability to detect large populations of faint sources, from those responsible for reionization to merging galaxies at cosmic dawn and the stellar populations of nearby dwarf galaxies. This capability is set, in part, by our ability to remove the sky from the target spectra. Here we describe the initial steps in a threeyear long effort to develop a model of the Maunakea skies comparable to the model developed by ESO of the southern ESO sites. The model will be used to derive best-practices (e.g. the number of required fibers given specific observing conditions, and required sensitivity) and sky subtraction algorithms to achieve << 1% sky subtraction accuracy
Maunakea Spectroscopic Explorer (MSE) is the only dedicated, >10 m class, multi-object facility under development on the best site in the Northern Hemisphere. MSE is designed to simultaneously obtain 4,332 spectra in three resolution modes in the optical and NIR. The design attributes of a wide field of view, a high multiplex capability, and the use of optical fibers to transport the light from the prime focus to two suites of spectrographs, mandate an efficient and precise science calibration process to account for the throughput and imaging variations between the astronomical targets at the detectors. To achieve MSE's science goals, the calibration process must enable accurate sky subtraction, wavelength correction, and spectrophotometry. In this paper, we continue our discussion on the science calibration requirements and procedures, and provide an update to the adopted calibration strategy, including likely operational features and hardware. This paper particularly focuses on two new aspects of MSE analysis, ghost behavior of the wide field corrector and the possible impact of satellite constellations on MSE observations.
Maunakea Spectroscopic Explorer (MSE) is the first of the future generation of massively multiplexed spectroscopic facilities. MSE is designed to enable transformative science, being completely dedicated to large-scale multi-object spectroscopic surveys, each studying thousands to millions of astrophysical objects. MSE uses an 11.25 m aperture telescope to feed 4,332 fibers over a wide 1.52 square degree field of view. It will have the capabilities to observe at a range of spectral resolutions, from R~3,000 to R~40,000, with all spectral resolutions available at all times and across the entire field. As a dedicated survey facility, MSE must be able to efficiently execute a wide variety of scientific programs at the same time. Here we describe plans to execute MSE’s Design Reference Survey, an exercise to plan for and simulate a sample of potential first-generation science programs that exercise the design parameters of the spectroscopic facility and identify any performance and functional deficiencies of the MSE Observatory. With this exercise we have begun to lay out a detailed plan of how to schedule and execute observations, including calibration data, in the first five years of the MSE project.
Maunakea Spectroscopic Explorer (MSE) is a dedicated multi-object spectroscopic facility that is a major upgrade to the Canada-France-Hawaii-Telescope (CFHT) on Maunakea, Hawaii, with a larger aperture and an expanded international partnership. MSE has completed its Conceptual Design Phase (CoDP) and is preparing for the upcoming Preliminary Design Phase.
KEYWORDS: Charge-coupled devices, Digital signal processing, Data acquisition, Image filtering, Signal to noise ratio, Telescopes, Clocks, Data conversion, Sensors, Amplifiers
MegaCam is Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope’s (CFHT) one-degree wide-field optical imager with an array of 40 CCDs that has been in operation since 2003 and remains the most demanded instrument at CFHT with an oversubscription of 2.5 each semester. Large programs requiring hundreds of nights dominate the available observing time leaving little for PI programs. To accommodate the demand and to improve overall observing efficiency, we launched the MegaCam FAST project to reduce the data acquisition time.
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