al partners. Details on teams looking for collaborators can be found at the Gen 4#3 webpage linked above. If you would like to add
your information here, please send an email.
Figure 7.
Prototype cryostat for
GHOST at the NRC-H.
Notices of intent to submit proposals are
due August 1, 2016, and proposals are due
on August 29, 2016. Any questions regarding the Gen 4#3 RfP can be directed to Karen
Godzyk via email here.
lens arrays to the fiber ends. The team will
do this after these arrays receive their optical coating.
The ANU keeps steadily working on both the
instrument control system software and the
data reduction pipeline.
GHOST on the Move
The Gemini High-resolution Optical SpecTrograph (GHOST) team has started the project’s build phase. This means that the two
organizations building the hardware — the
Australian Astronomical Observatory (AAO)
and the National Research Council Herzberg
(NRC-H) — are busy procuring and fabricating components; meanwhile, the Australian
National University (ANU) software team
continues to move forward on their work. As
components arrive, assemblies will be built
and tested. Several of these assemblies are
highlighted here.
The NRC-H has built a prototype cryostat for
the charge-coupled device (CCD) detector
system, shown in Figure 7. The tall cylinder
contains the cryocooler, with the vacuum
valve and vacuum sensor in front of the
cooler. NRC-H has used this prototype for
various tests to check the system design and
is now fabricating the final cryostats for the
instrument. The team will run them through
a series of tests before they are ready for
installation of the CCD detectors, the most
costly components in the instrument.
The AAO continues to make progress on
the optical cable assembly mentioned in
the April 2016 issue of GeminiFocus, page
21. The work to test the performance of the
optical fibers after the ends were fixed and
polished is complete, yielding excellent results. The next step is to attach the micro-
18
GeminiFocus
July 2016