JPCam is a 14-CCD mosaic camera, using the new e2v 9k-by-9k 10m-pixel 16-channel detectors, to be deployed on a dedicated 2.55m wide-field telescope at the OAJ (Observatorio Astrofísico de Javalambre) in Aragon, Spain. The camera is designed to perform a Baryon Acoustic Oscillations (BAO) survey of the northern sky. The J-PAS survey strategy will use 54 relatively narrow-band (~13.8nm) filters equi-spaced between 370 and 920nm plus 3 broad-band filters to achieve unprecedented photometric red-shift accuracies for faint galaxies over ~8000 square degrees of sky. The cryostat, detector mosaic and read electronics is being supplied by e2v under contract to J-PAS while the mechanical structure, housing the shutter and filter assembly, is being designed and constructed by a Brazilian consortium led by INPE (Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas Espaciais). Four sets of 14 filters are placed in the ambient environment, just above the dewar window but directly in line with the detectors, leading to a mosaic having ~10mm gaps between each CCD. The massive 500mm aperture shutter is expected to be supplied by the Argelander-Institut für Astronomie, Bonn.We will present an overview of JPCam, from the filter configuration through to the CCD mosaic camera. A brief outline of the main J-PAS science projects will be included.

The Spartan Infrared Camera provides tip-tilt corrected imaging for the SOAR Telescope in the 900-2500 nm spectral range with four 2048 × 2048 HAWAII-2 detectors. The camera has two plate scales: highresolution (40 mas pixel À1 ) for future diffraction-limited sampling in the H and K bands and wide-field (66 mas pixel À1 ) to cover a 5 0 × 5 0 field, over which tip-tilt correction is substantial. The design is described in detail. Except for CaF 2 field-flattening lenses, the optics are aluminum mirrors to thermally match the aluminum cryogenic-optical box in which the optics mount. The design minimizes the tilt of the optics as the instrument rotates on the Nasmyth port of the telescope. Two components of the gravitational torque on an optic are eliminated by symmetry, and the third component is minimized by balancing the optic. The optics (including the off-axis aspherical mirrors) were aligned with precise metrology. For the detector assembly, Henein pivots are used to provide frictionless, thermally compliant, lubricant-free, and thermally conducting rotation of the detectors. The heat load is 14 W for an ambient temperature of 10°C. Cooling down takes 40 hr. An activated-charcoal getter controls permeation through the large Viton O-ring for at least nine months. We present maps of the image distortion, which amount to tens of pixels at the greatest. The wavelength of the narrowband filters shift with position in the sky. The measured Strehl ratio of the camera itself is 0.81-0.84 at λ1650 nm. The width of the best K-band image was 260 mas in unexceptional seeing measured after tuning the telescope and before moving the telescope. Since images are normally taken after pointing the telescope to a different field, this supports the idea that the image quality could be improved by better control of the focus and the shape of the primary mirror. The instrument has proved to be capable of producing images that can be stitched together to measure faint, extended features and to produce photometry that agree internally to better than 0.01 mag and are well calibrated to 2MASS stars in the range of 12 < K < 16.

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International audienceThis article presents a description of a new Tunable Filter Instrument for the SOAR telescope. The Brazilian Tunable Filter Imager (BTFI) is a highly versatile new technology to be used both in seeing-limited mode and at higher spatial fidelity using the SAM Ground-Layer Adaptive Optics facility (SOAR Adaptive Module) which is being deployed at the SOAR telescope. Such an instrument presents important new science capabilities for the SOAR astronomical community, from studies of the centers of nearby galaxies and the insterstellar medium to statistical cosmological investigations. The BTFI concept takes advantage of three new technologies. The imaging Bragg Tunable Filter (iBTF) concept utilizes Volume Phase Holographic Gratings in a double-pass configuration as a tunable filter, while a new Fabry-Perot (FP) concept involves the use of commercially available technologies which allow a single FP etalon to act over a very large range of interference orders and hence spectral resolutions. Both of these filter technologies will be used in the same instrument. The combination allows for highly versatile capabilities. Spectral resolutions spanning the range between 25 and 30,000 can be achieved in the same instrument through the use of iBTF at low resolution and scanning FPs beyond R similar to 2; 000 with some overlap in the mid-range. The third component of the new technologies deployed in BTFI is the use of EMCCDs, which allow for rapid and cyclical wavelength scanning thus mitigating the damaging effect of atmospheric variability through the acquisition of the data cube. An additional important feature of the instrument is that it has two optical channels which allow for the simultaneous recording of the narrow-band, filtered image with the remaining (complementary) broadband light. This avoids the otherwise inevitable uncertainties inherent in tunable filter imaging using a single detector, which is subject to temporal variability of the atmospheric conditions. The system was designed to supply tunable filter imaging with a field-of-view of 3' on a side, sampled at 0.12 `' for direct Nasmyth seeing-limited area spectroscopy and for SAM's visitor instrument port for GLAO-fed area spectroscopy. The instrument has seen first light, mounted on the SOAR telescope, as a visitor instrument. It is now in commissioning phase

We present the basic concept of a new astronomical instrument: SPARC4 -Simultaneous Polarimeter and Rapid Camera in 4 bands. SPARC4 combines in one instrument: (i) photometric and polarimetric modes; (ii) sub-second time-resolution in photometric mode and excellent timeresolution in polarimetric mode; (iii) simultaneous imaging in four broad-bands for both modes. This combination will make SPARC4 a unique facility for ground-based optical observatories. Presently, the project is in its conceptual design phase.