Development of the opto-mechanical design for ICE-T

ICE-T (International Concordia Explorer Telescope) is a double 60 cm f/1.1 photometric robotic telescope, on a parallactic mount, which will operate at Dome C, in the long Antarctic night, aiming to investigate exoplanets and activity of the hosting stars. Antarctic Plateau site is well known to be one of the best in the world for observations because of sky transparency in all wavelengths and low scintillation noise. Due to the extremely harsh environmental conditions (the lowest average temperature is -80$^\circ$C) the criteria adopted for an optimal design are really challenging. Here we present the strategies we have adopted so far to fulfill the mechanical and optical requirements.Comment: 7 pages, 2 figures, contributed talk at 'An astronomical Observatory at Concordia (Dome C, Antarctica) for the next decade', 11-15 May, Rome (Italy

ELT high resolution spectrograph: phase-A software architecture study

High resolution spectroscopy has been considered of a primary importance to exploit the main scientific cases foreseen for ESO ELT, the Extremely Large Telescope, the future largest optical-infrared telescope in the world. In this context ESO commissioned a Phase-A feasibility study for the construction of a high resolution spectrograph for the ELT, tentatively named HIRES. The study, which lasted 1.5 years, started on March 2016 and was completed with a review phase held at Garching ESO headquarters with the aim to assess the scientific and technical feasibility of the proposed instrument. One of the main tasks of the study is the architectural design of the software covering all the aspects relevant to control an astronomical instrument: from observation preparation through instrument hardware and detectors control till data reduction and analysis. In this paper we present the outcome of the Phase-A study for the proposed HIRES software design highlighting its peculiarities, critical areas and performance aspects for the whole data flow. The End-toEnd simulator, a tool already capable of simulating HIRES end products and currently being used to drive some design decision, is also shortly described

EELT-HIRES the high-resolution spectrograph for the E-ELT

The first generation of E-ELT instruments will include an optic-infrared High Resolution Spectrograph, conventionally indicated as EELT-HIRES, which will be capable of providing unique breakthroughs in the fields of exoplanets, star and planet formation, physics and evolution of stars and galaxies, cosmology and fundamental physics. A 2-year long phase A study for EELT-HIRES has just started and will be performed by a consortium composed of institutes and organisations from Brazil, Chile, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and United Kingdom. In this paper we describe the science goals and the preliminary technical concept for EELT-HIRES which will be developed during the phase A, as well as its planned development and consortium organisation during the study.This work was supported from the Italian National Institute for Astrophysics (Istituto Nazionale Italiano di Astrofisica, INAF). RM , DB, CH, MF, XS, DQ and MGH acknowledge support from the UK Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC). MGH is supported by the ERC Advanced grant Emergence-32056. This work was supported by Fundaçao para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT, Portugal), project ref. PTDC/FIS-AST/1526/2014, through national funds and by FEDER through COMPETE2020 (ref. POCI-01-0145-FEDER-016886), as well as through grant UID/FIS/04434/2013 (POCI-01-0145-FEDER-007672). P.F. and N.C.S. also acknowledge the support from FCT through Investigador FCT contracts of reference IF/01037/2013, IF/00169/2012, and IF/00028/2014, respectively, and POPH/FSE (EC) by FEDER funding through the program “Programa Operacional de Factores de Competitividade - COMPETE”. P.F. further acknowledge support from FCT in the form of exploratory projects of reference IF/01037/2013CP1191/CT0001 and IF/00028/2014/CP1215/CT0002. PJA acknowledges financial support from AYA2011-30147-C03-01 and AYA2014-54348-C3-1-R by MINECO/Spain, partially supported by FEDER funds/EU. Research activities of the Board of Stellar Astronomy, at the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte are supported by continuous grant of CNPq, FAPERN and CAPES brazilian agencies and by the INCT INEspaço. E.D.M and V.Zh.A. also acknowledge the support from the FCT (Portugal) in the form of the grants SFRH/BPD/76606/2011 and SFRH/BPD/70574/2010, respectively

Main tasks for IRAIT installation at Dome C

IRAIT (International Robotic Antarctic Infrared Telescope) is a telescope with an 80 cm aperture, ready for installation at Dome C. Equipped with AMICA (Antarctic Multiband Infrared CAmera), the main focal plane instrument, it will observe in near (1–5 μ) and mid infrared regions (5–28 μ), benefiting from the exceptional site characteristics. The installation will start in December 2007. An overview of interfacing devices and the integration of various IRAIT subsystems are here presented

Optical Alignment of DORA Telescope: Design and description of the laboratory setup

In the current work we illustrate the design of the laboratory setup realized for the optical alignment of a deployable Cassegrain telescope for space applications, in the framework of the DORA (Deployable Optics for Remote sensing Applications) project. After a series of trade-off analyses leading to five different layouts, the best candidate in terms of compactness, reduced payload mass and volume, and minimal obstruction of the secondary mirror structure has been selected [1]. The optical components have been manufactured and the telescope prototype is currently under procurement, planned to be tested in the lab in the next months. We introduce the finite element structural analysis of the supporting frame structure for the installation of the prototype in a vertical configuration in which a laser collimating device will be used to reach the most accurate alignment

AMICA: the Antarctic Mid-Infrared CAmera for the IRAIT telescope

We report a preliminary study of the main focal plane instrument for the IRAIT telescope, currently being built at INAF-Astronomical Observatory of Teramo. The basic requirements are those of a remotely-controlled camera aimed to perform 10- and 20-μm photometry from Dome-C in the standard bandpasses N and Q. Starting from the site properties and the science goals, the main components of AMICA (Antarctic Mid-Infrared CAmera) are described: a Si:As BIB array detector, sensitive in the range 2–28 μm; a fully reflective optical design; a cryostat modified in order to work at the extreme environmental conditions of the antarctic plateau; a cryocooler maintaining the operating temperature of 4.2 K without external intervention; an automatized and flexible control electronics.
AMICA is designed to fully exploit the unique mid-infrared observing conditions at Dome-C

The IRAIT Project Infrared Astronomy from Antarctica

The Concordia Station (Candidi 2003), on the Antarctica Plateau, will soon become one of the best observatories to perform infrared observations in the 2–20 μm atmospheric windows and beyond, thanks to its low sky background, low temperature and high atmospheric transparency. The possibility of passively cooling the telescope is a further advantage. We describe here the first permanent Antarctic infrared telescope, under development for the Dome C base. It is the International Robotic Antarctic Infrared Telescope (IRAIT). We briefly outline a few scientific motivations for it, then we review the technical characteristics and the status of its development. The infrared camera for IRAIT is described in another dedicated paper in this volume