New Infrared Camera Gets Amazing Orion Images

The BBC is reporting, as is the Register, about the new Wide-Field Camera (WFCAM) on the UK Infrared Telescope (UKIRT) in Hawaii. WFCAM is the world's most powerful astronomical infrared camera. It's 5.4 meters long and weighs 1500 kilograms. As part of its commissioning, it produced some stunning images of interstellar clouds in Orion.

Comments

Re:Of all the photos , the one I liked

[Fweeky]

That's a great shot, let down purely by *insane* amounts of noise :(

Re:Sherpa scientists?

[Shag]

13760? Bah, that's comfy. Slightly uphill from UKIRT is the University of Hawaii's 88-inch scope, which is sited at roughly 13770 feet with its dome floor around 13790+. There are others on Mauna Kea with higher dome floors (bigger facilities, more modern) but 88 is the highest-sited scope in the world that's regularly manned every week of the year (and often every day), by day crew for maintenance and/or night operators.

Yes, I work there. No, I don't use oxygen. Below about 15000 feet the TUC (Time of Useful Consciousness) is "indefinite" which means some people can go hang out for 12-14 hours with nothing bad happening. There are some observatories up there that are talking about creating a single pressurized "break room" for staff - not where I work, though. :)

Oh, and the Rockwell HAWAII-2RG 2048x2048 sensors used to build UKIRT's WFCAM (it has 4 of them in a square array) were co-developed by U. of Hawaii, Rockwell Scientific and UMC, and first deployed in November of 2003 in the "ULB" camera on 88. For some time, 88 with ULB was the most powerful infrared setup for astrophotography; since UKIRT is the largest dedicated infrared scope in the world, it will now (with its own 16-megapixel camera) really take some great pictures. :) I was over at UKIRT for their 25th anniversary open house, and it's one BIG instrument.

...of course, Gemini South (8.1-meter) has ordered some HAWAII-2RG chips from Rockwell, I think... and the European folks are mumbling about doing a 4x4 array of them (64 megapixels) for their forthcoming VISTA telescope in Chile, which will be the bigger better successor to UKIRT.

Time to Die.

[rocketsled]

"I have seen attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I have seen C-beams glitter in the darkness at the Tannhauser Gate. All these moments will be lost in time like tears in rain. Time to die."