The Line Emission Mapper (LEM) is a Probe mission concept developed in response to NASA’s Astrophysics Probe Explorer (APEX) Announcement of Opportunity. LEM has a single science instrument composed of a large-area, wide-field X-ray optic and a microcalorimeter X-ray imaging spectrometer in the focal plane. LEM is optimized to observe low-surface-brightness diffuse X-ray emission over a 30′ equivalent diameter field of view with 1.3 and 2.5 eV spectral resolution in the 0.2−2.0 keV band. Our primary scientific objective is to map the thermal, kinetic, and elemental properties of the diffuse gas in the extended X-ray halos of galaxies, the outskirts of galaxy clusters, the filamentary structures between these clusters, the Milky Way star-formation regions, the Galactic halo, and supernova remnants in the Milky Way and Local Group. The combination of a wide-field optic with 18′′ angular resolution end-to-end and a microcalorimeter array with 1.3 eV spectral resolution in a 5′ × 5′ inner array (2.5 eV outside of that) offers unprecedented sensitivity to extended low-surface-brightness X-ray emission. This allows us to study feedback processes, gas dynamics, and metal enrichment over seven orders of magnitude in spatial scales, from parsecs to tens of megaparsecs. LEM will spend approximately 11% of its five-year prime science mission performing an All-Sky Survey, the first all-sky X-ray survey at high spectral resolution. The remainder of the five-year science mission will be divided between directed science (30%) and competed General Observer science (70%). LEM and the NewAthena/XIFU are highly complementary, with LEM’s optimization for soft X-rays, large FOV, 1.3 eV spectral resolution, and large grasp balancing the NewAthena/X-IFU’s broadband sensitivity, large effective area, and unprecedented spectral resolving power at 6 keV. In this presentation, we will provide an overview of the mission architecture, the directed science driving the mission design, and the broad scope these capabilities offer to the entire astrophysics community.
The first generation of ELT instruments includes an optical-infrared high resolution spectrograph, indicated as ELT-HIRES and recently christened ANDES (ArmazoNes high Dispersion Echelle Spectrograph). ANDES consists of three fibre-fed spectrographs ([U]BV, RIZ, YJH) providing a spectral resolution of ∼100,000 with a minimum simultaneous wavelength coverage of 0.4-1.8 μm with the goal of extending it to 0.35-2.4 μm with the addition of an U arm to the BV spectrograph and a separate K band spectrograph. It operates both in seeing- and diffraction-limited conditions and the fibre-feeding allows several, interchangeable observing modes including a single conjugated adaptive optics module and a small diffraction-limited integral field unit in the NIR. Modularity and fibre-feeding allows ANDES to be placed partly on the ELT Nasmyth platform and partly in the Coudé room. ANDES has a wide range of groundbreaking science cases spanning nearly all areas of research in astrophysics and even fundamental physics. Among the top science cases there are the detection of biosignatures from exoplanet atmospheres, finding the fingerprints of the first generation of stars, tests on the stability of Nature’s fundamental couplings, and the direct detection of the cosmic acceleration. The ANDES project is carried forward by a large international consortium, composed of 35 Institutes from 13 countries, forming a team of almost 300 scientists and engineers which include the majority of the scientific and technical expertise in the field that can be found in ESO member states.
We present the design of the ANDES UBV module, the bluest spectrograph of the ANDES instrument. It is a fiber-fed high resolution, high stability spectrograph, which will be installed on the ELT-Nasmyth platform to minimize blue fibre losses from the focal plane to the spectrograph. In this paper we present the status of development of the spectrograph, its optical design, and auxiliary devices like exposure meter and leveling system, at the preliminary design stage. As stability is the prime design driver, a thermal enclosure is provided to keep temperature of the optical train stable at ambient conditions, and the pressure is kept constant at high vacuum level. The science, sky background and simultaneous calibration light is fed to the spectrographs via fiber bundles of 66 fibres, which are arranged in a straight row forming the spectrograph slit.
The first generation of ELT instruments includes an optical-infrared high resolution spectrograph, indicated as ELT-HIRES and recently christened ANDES (ArmazoNes high Dispersion Echelle Spectrograph). ANDES consists of three fibre-fed spectrographs (UBV, RIZ, YJH) providing a spectral resolution of ∼100,000 with a minimum simultaneous wavelength coverage of 0.4-1.8 µm with the goal of extending it to 0.35-2.4 µm with the addition of a K band spectrograph. It operates both in seeing- and diffraction-limited conditions and the fibre-feeding allows several, interchangeable observing modes including a single conjugated adaptive optics module and a small diffraction-limited integral field unit in the NIR. Its modularity will ensure that ANDES can be placed entirely on the ELT Nasmyth platform, if enough mass and volume is available, or partly in the Coudé room. ANDES has a wide range of groundbreaking science cases spanning nearly all areas of research in astrophysics and even fundamental physics. Among the top science cases there are the detection of biosignatures from exoplanet atmospheres, finding the fingerprints of the first generation of stars, tests on the stability of Nature’s fundamental couplings, and the direct detection of the cosmic acceleration. The ANDES project is carried forward by a large international consortium, composed of 35 Institutes from 13 countries, forming a team of more than 200 scientists and engineers which represent the majority of the scientific and technical expertise in the field among ESO member states.
The Normal-incidence Extreme Ultraviolet Photometer (NExtUP) is a smallsat mission concept designed to measure the EUV radiation conditions of exoplanet host stars, and F-M type stars in general. EUV radiation is absorbed at high altitude in a planetary atmosphere, in the exosphere and upper thermosphere, where the gas can be readily heated to escape temperatures. EUV heating and ionization are the dominant atmospheric loss drivers during most of a planet’s life. There are only a handful of accurately measured EUV stellar fluxes, all dating from Extreme Ultraviolet Explorer (EUVE) observations in the ‘90s. Consequently, current models of stellar EUV emission are uncertain by more than an order of magnitude and dominate uncertainties in planetary atmospheric loss models. NExtUP will use periodic and aperiodic multilayers on off-axis parabolic mirrors and a prime focus microchannel plate detector to image stars in 5 bandpasses between 150 and 900°A down to flux limits two orders of magnitude lower than reached by EUVE. NExtUP may also accomplish a compelling array of secondary science goals, including using line-of-sight absorption measurements to understand the structure of the local interstellar medium, and imaging EUV emission from energetic processes on solar system objects at unprecedented spatial resolution. NExtUP is well within smallsat weight limits, requires no special orbital conditions, and would be flown on a spacecraft supplied by MOOG Industries. It draws on decades of mission heritage expertise at SAO and LASP, including similar instruments successfully launched and operated to observe the Sun.
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