Paper
24 September 2012 SPIES: the spectropolarimetric imager for the energetic sun
Author Affiliations +
Abstract
The SpectroPolarimetric Imager for the Energetic Sun (SPIES) is a project to develop a new class of spectropolarimetric instrument for the study of highly dynamic solar phenomena. Understanding the physics of dynamic solar phenomena requires detailed information about the magnetic, thermal, and dynamic properties of the solar atmosphere at every stage of their evolution. Although these properties can be obtained with existing highperformance spectropolarimeters such as the SpectroPolarimeter onboard the Hinode space solar observatory or the Facility IR Spectropolarimeter of the Dunn Solar Telescope, these instruments cannot observe the required field of view with temporal resolution that can resolve the dynamic timescale of these energetic events. SPIES-2K is an experimental true-imaging spectropolarimeter developed under this program to address this deficiency in our observing capability. It is based on a fiber-optic integral field unit containing 2,048 standard multimode fused silica fibers, and is capable of observing a 64 x 32 pixels field simultaneously with high spatial and spectral resolution. Moreover, it can obtain the full Stokes spectra of the field with a maximum temporal resolution of a few seconds. This paper presents the design and characteristics of the instrument, as well as preliminary results obtained at Fe I 1565 nm wavelength. Additionally, this paper also reports on recent studies of the polarization maintenance optical fiber ribbon constructed from rectangular element fibers for the Birefringence Fiber-Optic Image Slicer, and discusses its application to future generation of SPIES and other astronomical spectropolarimetry projects.
© (2012) COPYRIGHT Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE). Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.
Haosheng Lin "SPIES: the spectropolarimetric imager for the energetic sun", Proc. SPIE 8446, Ground-based and Airborne Instrumentation for Astronomy IV, 84461D (24 September 2012); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.926830
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Cited by 10 scholarly publications.
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KEYWORDS
Optical fibers

Polarization

Fiber optics

Spectrographs

Sun

Solar processes

Multimode fibers

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