W.M. Keck Observatory Semester 2010B Instruments

For detailed information about the instruments, please check the Instruments Home Page

Keck 1 Instruments are:
        HIRESb (blue x-disperser)
        HIRESr (red x-disperser)
        LRIS-ADC (red and blue, with ADC)
        LRISp-ADC (polarimeter, with ADC; see below.)
        LRIS (red and blue, without ADC, special request only)
        LRISp (polarimeter, without ADC, special request only)
        MICHELLE & NIRI at Gemini North and T-ReCS at Gemini South (see below)
        Suprime-Cam, FOCAS, HDS, MOIRCS, IRSC (with NGSAO with 188 elements), and COMICS at Subaru (see below)

Keck 2 Instruments are:
        DEIMOS
        ESI
        ESIi (ESI with the Integrated Field Unit)
        NIRSPEC (without AO)
        NIRSPAO-NGS (NIRSPEC with Natural Guide Star AO; see below.)
        NIRSPAO-LGS (NIRSPEC with Laser Guide Star AO; see below.)
        NIRC2-NGS
        NIRC2-LGS (see LGS note below)
        OSIRIS-NGS (see OSIRIS note below)
        OSIRIS-LGS (see OSIRIS and LGS note below)
        Suprime-Cam, FOCAS, HDS, MOIRCS, IRSC (with NGSAO with 188 elements), and COMICS at Subaru (see below)

Combined Keck 1 and Keck 2 Interferometer: Visibility science (standard mode and SPR mode), Nuller science plus shared-risk science in V^2(L-band) and Dual Field Phase Referencing (DFPR) modes.

Please note that Keck I and Keck II have different eastern and western telescope limits. This affects the times objects will be available for observing.

Special Notes for Semester 2010B:

Visitor Instruments: WMKO will not support any visitor instruments during semester 2010B.

Keck I

LRIS: The LRISr (red side) detectors are experiencing a charge transfer problem, and as of January, only one of four amplifiers behaves normally. Please see the latest update on the problem at the LRIS news pages for details.
Observers wishing to use LRIS or LRISp without the ADC must provide scientific justification in the special requests section of the coversheet.

MICHELLE and NIRI at Gemini North, T-ReCS at Gemini South: MICHELLE is a mid-infrared (8-25 micron) imager and spectrometer at Gemini North. T-ReCS is a similar instrument at Gemini South. NIRI is a Near InfraRed Imager and low resolution spectrograph at Gemini North. Through an exchange with the Gemini Observatory, up to five nights may be available to observers who would like to use MICHELLE, NIRI, or T-ReCS. Scheduled nights will be executed classically with the support of Gemini US (tier-1). Please watch the Gemini web site for details and updates on dates of instrument availability for all three instruments.

Keck II

ESI: Because of limited requests for ESI during recent semesters, we may restrict ESI to campaign mode (possibly two or three blocks of nights) during semester 2010B. This will depend on scientific requests. Observers should be prepared for their allocations to possibly be a month earlier or later than the requested dates. The ESI Integrated Field Unit is now released for observer use as of semester 2010B. This device employs an image slicer to produce spectra of a contiguous 4.0x5.7 arcsec field of view at the full ESI resolution, albeit with a 50% throughput loss. For further details please see the online Integrated Field Unit Observer Notes or contact the Keck instrument team at instrument@keck.hawaii.edu.

NIRSPEC: NIRSPEC was serviced in 2009B to increase its AO capability. An AO pupil stop was added to filter wheel 2 such that observers can now access all the filters in filter wheel 1 with AO. This includes the KL and M-wide filters. To make room for the new pupil stop, the Br-gamma filter was removed from NIRSPEC. NIRSPEC may be available in the AO mode (NIRSPAO) and scheduled in campaign mode during semester 2010B, depending upon science demand. We will need a minimum of three allocated nights for the AO mode before we will offer this capability. Timing of the NIRSPAO run will depend upon the science demand. On all NIRSPAO nights, NIRC2 is also available for use. Please note that for NIRSPAO-LGS, backup programs are required. Backup programs may use NIRC2 or NIRSPAO in NGS mode. NIRSPEC without AO is not available when NIRSPEC is in the AO configuration.

OSIRIS: OSIRIS will move from Keck II to Keck I when the Keck I laser and related systems are ready. As of this writing, the laser system has just begun on-sky testing. We anticipate the OSIRIS move will be no earlier than mid-December 2010 and possibly during semester 2011A. As the team works through the remaining open issues with the laser system, we will inform the TACs of the most up-to-date status. Please check your specific TAC call for proposals if you need further guidance when preparing your OSIRIS proposal. When OSIRIS does move, it will be unavailable for three to four months, after which it will be available for science on a shared-risk basis for another two to three months.

Suprime-Cam, FOCAS, HDS, MOIRCS, IRSC (with NGSAO with 188 elements), and COMICS at Subaru: Through an exchange with the Subaru Observatory, up to six nights may be available to observers who would like to use any of these instruments. Please check the Subaru web site for detailed descriptions of these instruments. As Subaru time will be traded for time on both telescopes, TACs will need to determine which telescope's time they will be trading when awarding Subaru time. The time will be up to four nights on Keck II and up to two nights on Keck I depending both on the Keck and the Subaru requests. Neither Keck nor Subaru will support Target of Opportunity (ToO) observations during the exchanged nights. All observations will be executed in the "classical" observing mode.

LGS-AO: NIRC2, OSIRIS, or NIRSPAO with laser guide star adaptive optics will be available. Up to 70 nights may be awarded as laser guide star nights during this semester. A more detailed set of guidelines for these nights and information on the capabilities of the system may be found on the the LGS-AO page. Backup programs for LGS proposals are essential. Backup programs for LGS may be either NGS programs or non-AO (seeing limited) NIRSPEC.

Combined Keck I and Keck II

Interferometer: For 2010B up to eight nights will be available to the community for interferometer science. More nights will be considered at the Director's discretion. Please see the NExScI web site for important details concerning planning for interferometer observations and for sensitivity and efficiency information. The fully operational modes are: K-band (5, 10, 42 and 330 channels) and H-band (4 channels) visibility, and N-band nulling. The nuller is fully available for science proposals in semester 2010B but future availability will be determined on a semeter-by-semester basis. The ASTRA-Dual Field Phase Referencing (DFPR), L-band and simultaneous K/L visibility modes are available for shared-risk proposals in this call. Observers proposing for the shared-risk modes are required to have a standard visibility mode backup science program. These shared-risk modes will not be available for split-night science on the same night. The NExScI Keck Interferometer Reconfiguration Page details which modes may be used in the same night along with the reconfiguration time between modes. All science observations with the Keck Interferometer are taken in service observing mode and may be scheduled in campaign mode. To maximize the science, performance characteriztion and engineering benefits of TAC-allocated science during the DFPR semester-10B shared risk availability, we strongly encourage science teams to collaborate with the NSF-funded ASTRA development team throughout the science process from planning to publication. To recognize their contribution, publications based on semester 10B DFPR data are strongly encouraged to include ASTRA team co-authors.

KOA (Keck Observatory Archive): Beginning with semester 2010A, data from NIRSPEC (including NIRSPAO) is archived into the Keck Observatory Archive (KOA). Data from HIRES will continue to also be archived in KOA. The default proprietary period for all data is 18 months. If observers desire a different proprietary period they may request this through the Keck coversheet. Please see the KOA homepage for information on the HIRES archive. Please see the KOA proprietary period policy for HIRES for more information. We anticipate a similar policy will shortly be in place for the NIRSPEC data.

For detailed information about the instruments, please check the Instruments Home Page

This page last updated 5-Feb-10. bas.