A polarimetric unit for HARPS-North at the Telescopio Nazionale Galileo: HANPO

Francesco Leone; Massimo Cecconi; Rosario Cosentino; Adriano Ghedina; Marina Giarrusso; Manuel Gonzalez; Vania Lorenzi; Matteo Munari; Hector Perez Ventura; Luis Riverol; Jose San Juan; Salvatore Scuderi

doi:10.1117/12.2054757

28 July 2014 A polarimetric unit for HARPS-North at the Telescopio Nazionale Galileo: HANPO

Francesco Leone, Massimo Cecconi, Rosario Cosentino, Adriano Ghedina, Marina Giarrusso, Manuel Gonzalez, Vania Lorenzi, Matteo Munari, Hector Perez Ventura, Luis Riverol, Jose San Juan, Salvatore Scuderi

Author Affiliations +

Proceedings Volume 9147, Ground-based and Airborne Instrumentation for Astronomy V; 91472F (2014) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2054757
Event: SPIE Astronomical Telescopes + Instrumentation, 2014, Montréal, Quebec, Canada

Abstract

Usually observational astronomy is based on direction and intensity of radiation considered as a function of wavelength and time. Despite the polarisation degree of radiation provides information about asymmetry, anisotropy and magnetic fields within the radiative source or in the medium along the line of sight, it is commonly ignored. Because of the importance of high resolution spectropolarimetry to study a large series of phenomena related to the interaction of radiation with matter, as in stellar atmospheres or more generally stellar envelopes, we designed and built a dual beam polarimeter for HARPS-N that is in operation at the Telescopio Nazionale Galileo. Since the polarisation degree is measured from the combination of a series of measurements and accuracy is limited by the instrumental stability, just the great stability (0.6 m/s) and spectral resolution (R=115000) of the HARPS-N spectrograph should result in an accuracy in the measurements of Stokes parameters as small as 0.01%. Here we report on the design, realization, assembling, aligning and testing of the polarimetric unit whose first light is planned in August 2014.

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Francesco Leone, Massimo Cecconi, Rosario Cosentino, Adriano Ghedina, Marina Giarrusso, Manuel Gonzalez, Vania Lorenzi, Matteo Munari, Hector Perez Ventura, Luis Riverol, Jose San Juan, and Salvatore Scuderi "A polarimetric unit for HARPS-North at the Telescopio Nazionale Galileo: HANPO", Proc. SPIE 9147, Ground-based and Airborne Instrumentation for Astronomy V, 91472F (28 July 2014); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2054757

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