The Infrared Spectrograph on the Spitzer Space Telescope

The Infrared Spectrograph (IRS) instrument on the Spitzer Space Telescope covered the 5 to 38 micron wavelength range at low and medium spectral resolutions. The instrument was very popular during Spitzers 5.7 year-long cold mission. Every year it attracted the most proposals, and garnered more observing hours, of any of the science instruments. This success was the culmination of a very long development period, where the instrument design changed radically. When the instrument was first selected by NASA in 1984 it was very complicated. As part of the overall reduction of the size of the SIRTF Observatory following its recovery from the missions cancellation in 1991 the IRS became smaller and much, much simpler. The only aspect of the instrument that increased from the original design was the pixel count of the detectors. The new, lean, IRS based on eight axioms: (1) SIRTF is a cost-driven mission; (2) Only Boeing Si:As and Si:Sb 128x128 BIB arrays shall be used; (3) The IRS has all Aluminum housing and optics; (4) Simple optics consisting of surfaces of revolution, flat gratings, and bolt-and-go tolerances; (5) No moving parts; (6) Redundancy only for credible single-point failures; (7) Strive for an observing efficiency of 80%; (8) The IRS shall be capable of internal health assessment. This led to a simple, robust, but still extremely powerful final instrument composed of four distinct modules. Many of the features developed for the IRS were subsequently employed in other spacecraft and SOFIA science instrumentation. This presentation will cover the developmental history of the IRS instrument, its final design and performance, and will especially highlight the sage decisions that Jim Houck made along the way that led to its highly successful career on the Spitzer Space Telescope

One millimeter continuum observations of extragalactic thermal sources

The results of 1 mm observations of extragalactic thermal sources are reported. The methods of making 1 mm observations are described. The instrumentation used to make the observation is described

Status of the SOFIA Observatory

The SOFIA observatory has been in routine science operations since returning in January from a 6 month-long heavy maintenance period for the aircraft and the telescope assembly. These operations include a successful 6 week deployment to the Southern hemisphere. This presentation will provide an update to the current operational status of the SOFIA observatory, concentrating on the improvements and upgrades that have been implemented since the heavy maintenance period

Studies of the Coldest Brown Dwarfs with the James Webb Space Telescope

The coolest T and Y-class Brown Dwarf objects are very faint and are therefore very poorly understood, since they are barely detectable with the current astronomical instrumentation. The upcoming James Webb Space Telescope now in development for a launch in the Fall of 2018 will have vastly increased sensitivity in the near and mid-infrared compared to any current facilities and will not be affected by telluric absorption over its entire wavelength range of operations. As a result it will be an ideal tool to obtain information about the composition and temperature-pressure structure in these objects' atmospheres. This presentation will outline the JWST guaranteed time observing plans for these studies

A progress report on using bolometers cooled by adiabatic demagnetization refrigeration

For sensitive detection of astronomical continuum radiation in the 200 micron to 3 mm wavelength range, bolometers are presently the detectors of choice. In order to approach the limits imposed by photon noise in a cryogenically cooled telescope in space, bolometers must be operated at temperatures near 0.1 K. Researchers report progress in building and using bolometers that operate at these temperatures. The most sensitive bolometer had an estimated noise equivalent power (NEP) of 7 x 10(exp 017) W Hz(exp -1/2). Researchers also briefly discuss the durability of paramagnetic salts used to cool the bolometers

Surveillance and Comparison of Anaplasma Phagoctyophilum (Formerly Erlichia Equi) within Ixodes Scapularis Ticks in Selected Southeastern States

Anaplasma phagocytophilum is an obligate intracellular bacterium that can infect and cause disease in horses, Equine Granuloctic Anaplasmosis. The bacterium is present in the western and northeastern United States, Europe, and Asia. In this investigation, samples of Ixodes scapularis were collected from selected barrier islands and mainland sites where feral and domestic equine populations are present, respectively. Each sample was individually screened using nested PCR to amplify a fragment of the ank and 16S rRNA genes. The prevalence of A. phagocytophilum in I. scapularis ticks was 20% (n=808). The highest infection rate was seen at a barrier island site (22%, n=774). The remaining five sites had prevalence ranging from 0% (n=9) to 19% (n=51). Randomly chosen positive PCR samples from each site were sequenced, and a BLAST search verified the isolates as A. phagocytophilum, which shared sequence homology with isolates from the northeastern United States

The Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA) - Current Status, Recent Results, Future Plans, and Synergies with the AKARI Archive

The Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy comprises a 2.7m diameter telescope mounted in a heavily modified B747SP aircraft. The SOFIA program is a joint US NASA and German DLR program, with the development and operations costs split roughly 80%:20%, respectively. Although the observatory is funded by these two nations, its observing time is open to proposals from astronomers of any nationality. The observatory has been flying and taking scientific data since 2010 and currently observes astronomical targets from the stratosphere for approximately 800 research flight hours per year. Seven science instruments (with an eighth coming online in 2020) cover the visible to sub-millimeter wavelengths with a variety of spectral resolutions ranging up to 1e8. The AKARI Archive with its 1.7 to 180 micron wavelength coverage is a natural complementary source for follow-up observations with SOFIA. This presentation will cover the current SOFIA technical capabilities and will present a few recent science highlights that demonstrate the SOFIA/AKARI complementarity. The presentation will also cover the SOFIA proposal process and will summarize other partnership opportunities for additional observing time on SOFIA

NASA's Orgins Space Telescope Mission and Its Synergies with SOFIA

The Origins Space Telescope (OST) is the mission concept for the Far Infrared Surveyor, a study in development by NASA in preparation for the 2020 Astronomy and Astrophysics Decadal Survey. The science program that has been selected to drive the OST performance requirements is broad, covering four main themes: Charting the Rise of Metals, Dust, and the First Galaxies; Unveiling the Growth of Black Holes and Galaxies Over Cosmic Time; Tracing the Signatures of Life and the Ingredients of Habitable Worlds; and Characterizing Small Bodies in the Solar System. The OST telescope itself will have a primary mirror diameter of 8-15 m (depending on the launch vehicle that is selected), will be diffraction-limited at 40m, and will be actively cooled to approximately 5K. Five science instruments have been base-lined for the observatory: a heterodyne instrument covering 150-500 m with a spectral resolving power of R1e7; a low-spectral resolution (R500) spectrometer covering 35-500 m; a high-spectral resolution (R1e5) spectrometer covering 50-500 m; a far-infrared imager (R15) covering 35-500m; and a mid-infrared imagerspectrometer (R15-500) covering 6-40m. In addition to having a vastly higher sensitivity than the corresponding SOFIA instrumentation that will allow more detailed follow-up of SOFIAs discoveries, the OST mission will be configured to provide efficient large-area mapping, which will further complement SOFIAs science capabilities by providing new targets for study by SOFIA. Furthermore, new SOFIA instruments can provide an excellent testbed for the advanced far-infrared detector technologies what will be required to achieve the anticipated OST performance

The epigenetic modifier DNMT3A is necessary for proper otic placode formation

Cranial placodes are thickenings in the ectoderm that give rise to sensory organs and peripheral ganglia of the vertebrate head. At gastrula and neurula stages, placodal precursors are intermingled in the neural plate border with future neural and neural crest cells. Here, we show that the epigenetic modifier, DNA methyl transferase (DNMT) 3A, expressed in the neural plate border region, influences development of the otic placode which will contribute to the ear. DNMT3A is expressed in the presumptive otic region at gastrula through neurula stages and later in the otic placode itself. Whereas neural plate border and non-neural ectoderm markers Erni, Dlx5, Msx1 and Six1 are unaltered, DNMT3A loss of function leads to early reduction in the expression of the key otic placode specifier genes Pax2 and Gbx2 and later otic markers Sox10 and Soho1. Reduction of Gbx2 was first observed at HH7, well before loss of other otic markers. Later, this translates to significant reduction in the size of the otic vesicle. Based on these results, we propose that DNMT3A is important for enabling the activation of Gbx2 expression, necessary for normal development of the inner ear

Interstellar Chemistry: Radiation, Dust and Metals

An overview is given of the chemical processes that occur in primordial systems under the influence of radiation, metal abundances and dust surface reactions. It is found that radiative feedback effects differ for UV and X-ray photons at any metallicity, with molecules surviving quite well under irradiation by X-rays. Starburst and AGN will therefore enjoy quite different cooling abilities for their dense molecular gas. The presence of a cool molecular phase is strongly dependent on metallicity. Strong irradiation by cosmic rays (>100x the Milky Way value) forces a large fraction of the CO gas into neutral carbon. Dust is important for H2 and HD formation, already at metallicities of 10^-4-10^-3 solar, for electron abundances below 10^-3.Comment: Invited contribution to IAU Symposium 255 -- Low-Metallicity Star Formation: From the First Stars to Dwarf Galaxie