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The AAO Instrument Science Group

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The instrument science group at the AAO :-

• develops new astronomical instrumentation techniques and related science
• provides scientific and engineering support to AAO instrumentation projects (instruments for both the AAO and for external customers) - often acting as an 'interface' between scientists and engineering staff on instrument development
• pushes the frontiers of astronomical technologies to keep the AAO internationally competitive

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People

• Roger Haynes (Head of Group)
• Andrew McGrath
  
• Anthony Horton
• Simon Ellis
  
• Will Saunders
  


• Joss Bland-Hawthorn - Affiliated
  
• Peter Gillingham - Affiliated
  


• Dionne Haynes  - MPhil Student
  

Technology Development Projects

The instrument science group develops new astronomical instrumentation techniques and pushes the frontiers of astronomical technologies to keep the AAO internationally competitive

Current studies

• OH Suppression fibres
• Integrated Photonic Spectrographs
• Light loss characterisation and minimisation in optical fibres
  
• Tunable fibre Bragg gratings for temporal astronomy
  

Previous studies

• Astrophotonics: the application of photonic technology to astronomical instruments
• Robotic positioning systems
  
• Starbugs
  
• Echidna
• Kickbots
  
• Fibre optic developments
• Deep space laser communications
  
• ExoMars spectrograph
• Narrow band filters
  
• Tunable filters

Instrument projects

The instrument science group provides detailed scientific and engineering support to AAO instrumentation projects

Current instrument builds

• New 6dF field plate
• FMOS/Echidna
  
• Telescope Control System

Current design studies

• PILOT - Pathfinder for an International Large Optical Telescope
• WFMOS
• WFMOS-A

Previous instrument builds

• 6dF
• AAOmega
• Dazle
• IRIS2
• LDSS++
  
• OzPoz
  
• Optical Detector Controllers
• Taurus II
  
• SOAR-IFU Prototype
  
• SPIRAL-IFU
• SPIRAL Spectrograph
  

Previous design studies

• AAOmicron
  
• Australis
• ALTAS
• APT
• CIRPOS
• CYCLOPS
• Extremely Large Telescope (ELT) technology concepts
• FASTCAM
  
• FitzMACRO
• GIRMOS
• HESP
• Honeycomb
  
• IRIS2-g
  
• KAOS
  
• KOSMOS
• MOMFOS
• MOMSI
• MOS-UCLES
• NGST_IR-Fibres
• NTT_PNS
• OSIRIS Tunable Filters
  
• Ukidna
• WiFeS

Publications

Contact details

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Last updated by Roger Haynes on 17th June 2008

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© Anglo-Australian Observatory 2006
PO Box 296, Epping NSW 1710 Australia
Updated on Friday, 14-Nov-2008 15:03:37 EST