Wide-field CCD imager for the 6.5-m MMT telescope

Brian A. McLeod; Daniel G. Fabricant; John C. Geary; Andrew H. Szentgyorgyi

doi:10.1117/12.236104

25 March 1996 Wide-field CCD imager for the 6.5-m MMT telescope

Brian A. McLeod, Daniel G. Fabricant, John C. Geary, Andrew H. Szentgyorgyi

Proceedings Volume 2654, Solid State Sensor Arrays and CCD Cameras; (1996) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.236104
Event: Electronic Imaging: Science and Technology, 1996, San Jose, CA, United States

Abstract

The conversion of the Multiple Mirror Telescope from six 1.8 m primary mirrors to a single 6.5 m primary will significantly increase its capability for imaging. The f/5 configuration will provide a corrected field of view for imaging that is flat and 30 arcminutes in diameter. The image quality in the absence of atmospheric seeing is 0'.1 over the full field. We are currently designing a camera system to take advantage of this large field. The proposed direct imaging system will be located at the Cassegrain focus of the telescope, behind a three-element refractive corrector. We will use an array of 8 X 4 three-edge-buttable CCDs, each with 2048 X 4096 pixels and two output amplifiers. This will provide a field of view of 24' X 24'. With a new packaging scheme we will reduce the gap along the readout edge to a few millimeters. The pixel size is 15 microns, or 0'.09, well sampling the point-spread- function. In many applications it will be possible to bin the pixels, thus reducing the amount of data (500 Mb per read at full resolution). The back-illuminated CCDs will be thinned and anti- reflection coated to provide high quantum efficiency from 320 to 1000 nm. The camera system will be useful for many studies requiring both a large collecting area and large area coverage on the sky. Planned projects include redshift and photometric surveys of faint galaxies, searches for high-redshift quasars and searches for objects in the outer solar system.

Citation Download Citation

Brian A. McLeod, Daniel G. Fabricant, John C. Geary, and Andrew H. Szentgyorgyi "Wide-field CCD imager for the 6.5-m MMT telescope", Proc. SPIE 2654, Solid State Sensor Arrays and CCD Cameras, (25 March 1996); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.236104

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