Indian scientists have intriguingly designed and developed a low-cost optical spectrograph that detects sources of weak light from distant quasars and galaxies in a very young universe, regions around horrible black holes around galaxies, and explosions. cosmic.
Such imported spectroscopes were imported at high costs. The optical spectrograph ‘Made in India’ named Aries-Devasthal Faint Object Spectrograph & Camera (ADFOSC), designed and developed natively by Aryabhatta Research Institute of Observational Sciences (ARIES), Nainital, an independent institute of Department of Science and Technology (DST), Government of India, about 2.5 times cheaper than compared to the imported ones and can find light sources with photon level as low as about 1 photon every second.
The spectroscope, the largest of its kind among the celestial astronomers in the country, was successfully commissioned on the 3.6-m Devasthal Optical Telescope (DOT), the largest in the country and in Asia, near Nainital Uttarakhand.
This instrument, the backbone of the 3.6-m DOT for observing very weak square sources, uses a complex arrangement of several lenses made of special glasses, polished to a better than smooth 5 -nanometer to produce sharp images of the celestial spheres. Photons come from distant square sources, collected by the telescope, ordered in different colors by the spectrograph and eventually converted into electronically recorded signals using a Connected Device camera Charges (CCD) developed to a very low temperature of – 120 0C. The total cost of this instrument is close to Rs. 4 Crore.
Dr. Amitesh Omar, the scientist at ARIES, led this project with a technical and scientific team, which together studied and developed various optical, mechanical and electronic subsystems of the spectrum and the camera. The spectrograph is currently being used by astronauts from India and abroad to study distant quasars and galaxies in a very young universe, regions around horrible black holes around galaxies, cosmic explosions such as supernovae and full-blown Gamma-ray explosions, young and large stars. , and small rugged galleries.
“The indigenous efforts to build complex instruments like ADFOSC in India is an important step to become an‘ Aatmanirbhar ’in the field of astronomy & astronomy,” said Dr. Dipankar Banerjee, Director, ARIES.
Experts from various national institutions, organizations, including the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) and some micro-small enterprises, were involved in reviewing and building parts of the instrument for example. of effective collaboration. With this experience, ARIES now plans to commission more complex instruments such as a spectro-polarimeter and a high-spectrum spectrograph on the Devasthal 3.6-ma telescope soon.
(With results from PIB)