At the present time, several new Gemini instruments are being delivered and commissioned. The Near-Infrared Coronagraph has been extensively tested and commissioned on the Gemini-South telescope, and will soon begin a large survey to discover extrasolar planets. The FLAMINGOS-2 near-IR multi-object spectrograph is nearing completion at the University of Florida, and is expected to be delivered to Gemini-South by the end of 2008. Gemini's Multi-Conjugate Adaptive Optics bench has been successfully integrated and tested in the lab, and now awaits integration with the laser system and the Gemini-South AO Imager on the telescope. We also describe our efforts to repair thermal damage to the Gemini Near-IR Spectrograph that occurred last year. Since the last update, progress has been made on several of Gemini's next generation of ambitious "Aspen" instruments. The Gemini Planet Imager is now in the final design phase, and construction is scheduled to begin shortly. Two competitive conceptual design studies for the Wide-Field Fiber Multi-Object Spectrometer have now started. The Mauna Kea ground layer monitoring campaign has collected data for well over a year in support of the planning process for a future Ground Layer Adaptive Optics system.
We describe a simple and cost-effective concept for implementing a Ground Layer Adaptive Optics (GLAO) system on
Gemini that will feed all instruments mounted at the Cassegrain focus. The design concept can provide a GLAO
correction to any of the current or future seeing-limited optical or near-infrared Gemini instruments. The GLAO design
uses an adaptive secondary mirror and provides a significant upgrade to the current telescope acquisition-and-guide
system while reusing and building upon the existing telescope facilities and infrastructure.
This paper discusses the overall design of the GLAO system including optics, opto-mechanics, laser guide star facilities,
natural and laser guide stars wavefront sensors. Such a GLAO system will improve the efficiency of essentially all
observations with Gemini and also will help with scheduling since it virtually eliminates poor seeing.
First, a status report is given for the on-going (Phase 2) instruments under construction now for Gemini. These instruments will be deployed during 2006 and 2007 at Gemini-South and collectively represent the end of an era of instrument building within the Gemini Partnership. Next, scientific applications and technical details for the next generation of "Aspen" instruments is described. These advanced future instruments will support breakthrough research in areas like extra-solar planets, dark matter, and dark energy. Gemini's ambitious adaptive optics development program in both current and future Aspen instruments is also described. Finally, a look back at some of the trials and tribulations of building instruments at Gemini is presented, with an eye toward the lessons of yesterday, how they helped mold today's program, and how they will likely impact the procurement of future instruments at Gemini.
Gemini's instrument program, which has existed for about a decade, has recently produced enough instruments to fully populate all of the instrument ports on both Gemini-N and Gemini-S. These delivered instruments, as well as those currently under construction and due to be delivered in the next ~2 years, are described in this report. We also summarize the bold new directions Gemini's development program will go in the next 5-10 years, as our Community embarks upon a new science mission to answer some of the most fundamental questions in astronomy.
The Gemini Near-Infrared Imager (NIRI) has now been completed and is in operation at the telescope. This paper discusses the basic design of the instrument and a number of particularly interesting technical issues. NIRI offers three different pixel scales to match different operating modes of the Gemini telescope and allows polarimetric and spectroscopic observations. It is equipped with an infrared wavefront sensor to allow tip-tilt correction even in highly obscured regions.
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