MOSAIC - Instruments for ELT

ESO, the European Southern Observatory, is the main astronomy organisation in Europe and runs the world´s most productive astronomical observatory in Chile, and is a major  partner in ALMA. ESO is now undertaking its most ambitious project ever: the construction of the Extremely Large Telescope (ELT).

With a primary mirror diameter of 39 meters, ELT will have a light gathering power 20 times greater than todays largest optical telescopes and be able to observe fainter and more distant objects than ever before.

ELT will be equiped with a number of scientific instruments that facilitate a detailed analysis of the light gathered from astronomical sources. While the telescope itself is constructed by ESO, the instruments are built by European consortia. Two of the instruments for ELT are of special interest to Sweden: HIRES and MOSAIC.

HIRES is a high resolution spectrometer, and MOSAIC a multi-object spectrometer that allows the collection of spectra from many objects simultaneously.SELTIC is the Swedish Extremely Large Telescope Instrumentation Consortium and is a joint effort between Lund, Stockhom and Uppsala universities. It was established following a successful grant application to VR/RFI in the 2017 call.

We were then awarded funding to participate in the HIRES and MOSAIC. For HIRES we got the funds needed for a full participation towards the construction.

For MOSAIC we got funding for the first two years to start working towards the realisation of the instrument, and with an invitation to come back and ask for the hardware and the remainding work effort.

Hence this proposal.Through participation in MOSAIC and HIRES Swedish scientists will be in an ideal position to optimally use ELT and its huge discovery potential.

Moreover, the SELTIC project benefits from industrial developments on fiber technology in Sweden and would strengthen the connection between Swedish industry and optical instrumentation for ESO,  something which has been a weakness in the past.