A Low-Resolution Multislit Spectrograph for 20-30 Meter Telescopes

摘要

A design is proposed for a slit mask spectrograph for wide-field 20 and 30 m telescopes that overcomes the problem of the very large physical size of their focal surfaces. The design divides the focal surface into many spectrograph cells which are deployed in a hexagonal pattern to cover the field of view. When fully implemented, in a single exposure one can obtain up to 1692 and 1036 spectra, respectively, with the 20 and 30 m telescope spectrographs. The spectrograph can be used from 4000 to 9500 A. Almost any object in the complete field of view can be observed if two exposures are made. The weight of the fully implemented instrument is approximately 16,500 kg, and the cost is approximately