NASA Time Available on CHIRON/1.5m

Todd Henry & Steve Heathcote

Observing time for exoplanet (and other) research is again available with the CHIRON high-resolution spectrograph on the CTIO/SMARTS 1.5m telescope in the 2019B semester.

The exoplanet observing time is made available through the NASA-NSF Exoplanet Observational Research (NN-EXPLORE) Program, with TESS follow-up currently a high priority. In the 2019A semester, seven NASA programs were awarded a total of 40 nights with CHIRON, and a similar number of nights are to be awarded in the 2019B semester. An estimated 18 nights of NOAO time will also be available in 2019B for general scientific programs not limited to exoplanet science.

CHIRON is primarily known as a radial velocity instrument that is used to detect exoplanets, brown dwarfs, and stellar companions orbiting stars in the solar neighborhood, with a typical velocity precision of 10-30 m/s for bright stars (V = 7-12; Figure 1). An example of the use of CHIRON for TESS follow up is the confirmation of a hot Jupiter in a 3.3-day orbit around the mildly evolved F/G star HD 202772 (Wang et al. 2019, AJ, 157, 51). Other programs that have used CHIRON to great effect include mapping the orbits of spectroscopic binaries, nightly monitoring of novae, and stellar youth and metallicity studies.

CHIRON observations are taken by SMARTS observers at the CTIO 1.5m in a queue operated by the RECONS team in Atlanta. The queue offers significant scheduling flexibility that allows a wide range of research avenues to be explored. For details about observing with CHIRON at the CTIO/SMARTS 1.5m please contact Todd Henry at thenry@astro.gsu.edu.

All proposals for 1.5m time should be submitted using the standard NOAO Observing Proposal Form. For time under the NN-EXPLORE program select “NASA Exoplanet TAC (WIYN 3.5m) or (CTIO 1.5m)” as the proposal type on the login page. These proposals are evaluated by a special TAC panel that also evaluates NN-EXPLORE proposals for WIYN. For regular NOAO proposals select “Standard (NOAO TAC)”. These proposals are reviewed by the regular TAC panel for the corresponding area of investigation. Further information will be available in the 2019B Call for Proposals, which will be posted on the NOAO website on 1 Mar 2019.