Gemini staff contributions
News for Users
A summary of news events throughout 2018 of relevance to the
Gemini user community.
Figure 1.
Jesse Ball (foreground)
operates the Gemini
North telescope during
on-sky commissioning of
the new TOPTICA laser.
Joining him are (from
left to right) adaptive
optics science fellow
Laure Catala (in hat),
optical engineer Tom
Schneider, and Gemini
scientist Paul Hirst.
Credit: Joy Pollard
JANUARY 2019
Gemini North TOPTICA Laser Availability
The TOPTICA laser has been successfully commissioned for nighttime operation at Gemini
North. The Laser Guide Star (LGS) mode will be available for Fast Turnaround and Direc-
tor’s Discretionary programs using the Phase 1 Tool released on December 11, 2018. The
new laser allows us to move away from block scheduling and offer LGS mode on a greater
number of nights. We are in the process of activating one Large program that was put on
hold when our old LGS system failed.
During on-sky commissioning, we confirmed the stability of delivered power by the TOP-
TICA laser (Figure 1). We estimated the on-sky return
to be the equivalent of an ~8 magnitude star (V mag),
when propagating at zenith. This of course will vary
as the sodium layer density fluctuates. In terms of im-
age quality delivered by the adaptive optics system
in LGS mode, a brief summary of the commissioning
results is given in the table on the next page.
LLP Call for Proposals
Gemini Observatory is again accepting Large and
Long Program (LLP) proposals in 2019. LLPs are Prin-
cipal Investigator-defined and -driven programs that,
as a guideline, either require significantly more time
than a partner typically approves for a single program
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GeminiFocus
January 2019 / 2018 Year in Review