GHOST Update

For the past six months, the assembly, alignment, and testing of Gemini’s High-resolution Optical SpecTrograph (GHOST), in Victoria, British Columbia Canada, have gone very close to plan. Coming to the Gemini South telescope, GHOST was designed, and is being built and tested, by a partnership of organizations: Australian Astronomical Optics (AAO) – Macquarie University, the National Research Council Canada (NRC) – Herzberg, the Australian National University (ANU), and Software Design Ideas. The spectrograph has performed excellently during the Acceptance Testing of the past few months (see sample spectra below). Test results for resolution, throughput, and stability all look great in the lab. The team will repeat the verification of these and other performance requirements after reassembly at Gemini South. AAO previously shipped the Cassegrain Acquisition Unit to Chile from Australia and tested it in advance of the upcoming arrival of the spectrograph. After the spectrograph, slit viewer, and optical cable arrive in Chile, we expect to have all sub-assemblies of the GHOST instrument fully integrated and functioning during the second quarter of CY2020 in preparation for commissioning.