Liger: Initiating Fabrication of Next Generation Keck Imager and Spectrograph

The Liger instrument will allow astronomers to study solar systems around other stars, other galaxies and the regions near black holes. This instrument is a large complex unit. This project will allow the team developing this concept to continue their design work and build an important component of that system that operates at low temperature. In addition, the participants plan to expand a portable planetarium outreach program, Cosmic Tours, to better support San Diego County elementary and middle schools with curated shows that incorporate the Next Generation Science Standards. The Liger instrument envisaged for deployment at the Keck Observatory will combine an adaptive optics-fed integral field spectrograph and imaging camera that operate simultaneously in the near-infrared (0.81-2.45 μm). This project will maintain Liger’s fabrication momentum and provide the necessary research and development on a subsystem of the full instrument. Specifically, the plan is to fabricate, integrate, and cryogenically characterize the imager detector assembly that houses both the Teleydne Hawaii-2RG detector and pick-off mirrors that direct light to each of the lenslet and slicer integral field spectrograph components. A cryogenic chamber will be fabricated and integrated for alignment of the Liger imager and for testing the detector assembly. In parallel, software will be developed that uses the latest MACIE controllers with the Teledyne Hawaii-2RG. This testing will be the main component of a graduate student’s thesis work. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.