The short summary of Kitt Peak status is that it is alive and pretty well, but about to undergo a period of change. We celebrated together last fall the 40th anniversary of the establishment of the observatory, based on the date that the Tohono O'odham Nation approved the agreement with the NSF. We are justifiably proud of the scientific edifice that has been built up here on Kitt Peak over the 40 years since that October agreement.
What have we accomplished over the last year? The major initiative I talked about a year ago was our plan to create a partnership to bring a new wide-field 2.4-m telescope to the mountain, to replace the aging 0.9-m. The partnership was created with the University of Colorado and the University of Minnesota. We had agreement from NASA for a loan of the Hubble spare primary mirror. We submitted a proposal from KPNO to the National Science Foundation for our share of the cost of the project. Although it got excellent peer reviews and the highest ranking in the competition within the astronomy division, it was not viewed as competitive at the Math and Physical Sciences Division Level. We resubmitted the proposal to a different program, but funding was not possible there, either. We have therefore been forced to abandon that effort and release our claim on the Hubble spare mirror. We will concentrate on major instrumentation and telescope upgrades to maintain Kitt Peak's competitive edge.
The last year saw major progress in improving the delivered image quality of our major telescopes. The 4-Meter Active Primary Support System (4-MAPS) was installed and has been in active commissioning under the leadership of Chuck Claver, Tony Abraham, Scott Bulau, Dave Mills, and their team. The telescope has already delivered images in the 0.5-0.8" range, a performance not seen since its early days. The WIYN telescope also continues its tune-up under the guidance of Charles Corson. A major advance has been the equalization of the temperature zones on the primary mirror. A visiting instrument recorded 0.32" images (March 1999 NOAO Newsletter), which shows what this mountain and that telescope can really deliver.
We will see a number of exciting new instruments on the way in the future. SQIID is coming to life again, with a plan for four 5122 InSb detectors from the ALADDIN program. T&E time is planned for this year. We have supported Richard Elston and his group at the University of Florida in the development of FLAMINGOS, a wide-field imager and multi-object spectrograph for the near-infrared. It will have a field of view of over 20' on a side at the 2.1-m, and will use cooled multi-slit masks for spectroscopy at the 4-m. We expect to see it here for T&E in about a year. Chuck Claver, David Vaughnn and their team have successfully passed the preliminary design review for the WIYN tip/tilt module, which will sharpen the optical light images from the telescope yet further (see related article at the beginning of this Newsletter).
For the five-year timescale, we see two major new instruments for KPNO. One is a wide field of view near-IR imager. For scale, our biggest format imager at present is ONIS, which has a 512 × 1024 format. The new imager is planned to have a 4096 × 4096 format, to cover a substantial area of the sky. We are exploring a partnership for this instrument to get the resources and technical support for an early deployment. We plan on some renovations to the 2.1-m to accommodate the new instrument and to improve its delivered image quality for the surveys to be undertaken there. The other instrument is a new, very wide-field spectrograph intended for the 4-m. It will employ the new volume-phase gratings being developed by Sam Barden and his industrial partners. The goal is to achieve twice the efficiency of the old R-C spectrograph, with multi-slits that can cover a 40' field of view.
The scientific productivity of our observatory has remained as high as ever over the last year. There were 269 articles in refereed scientific journals using KPNO data and/or having our staff as authors. I can cite three examples from our reports to the NSF that illustrate the breadth of the science from our nighttime telescopes.
1) From early X-ray surveys, it was thought that clusters of galaxies developed their halos of hot gas fairly late in cosmic history. New analysis of X-ray data, coupled with key ground-based data from KPNO has shown that there are far more X-ray detections at higher redshift than previously thought. The result is that the incidence of clusters with hot X-ray halos does not decrease as we look back in cosmic time, and that we don't yet know the epoch of formation of these halos, but it's much earlier than we previously thought.
2) Present-day elliptical galaxies obey a tight relationship among size, brightness, and internal stellar motions called the fundamental plane. The existence of such a relationship teaches us something fundamental about the formation and dynamical history of these galaxies, although the key theoretical connection has not yet been firmly made. To complicate affairs, investigators at the 0.9-m have found that the fundamental plane warps for galaxies at higher redshifts. The effect most likely arises from the difference in age of the stellar population at earlier cosmic times, changing the brightness part of the relation.
3) The formation of a star can be a very dynamic phenomenon, with gas accreting onto the star from a surrounding disk, and jets of material being shot out from the poles of the rotating system. Imaging from the 0.9-m and 4-m with Mosaic show that some of these jets extend for light years into space, much farther than previously imagined. The consequence is that the jets can propel molecules and other material far from the parent star and even create shock waves that could trigger other energetic events in the area of star formation.
We have a continuing record of excellence, yet we had to cope with a stunning budget reduction this year. My old aunt used to say, "If you're so smart, why aren't you rich?" The paraphrase for our situation: "If you're so good, why was your budget cut?" The RIFs we just experienced were the result of a required reduction of almost 10%, comparable to that in 1993.
I compare our situation to the best run long-haul passenger railroad in 1960. We have outstanding equipment and people rave about our service, but in a few years the majority of our passengers will be taking the plane. The investors are already shifting their money to the airlines. We'll have to figure out how to diversify and haul some more freight if we want to stay ahead.
Just like investors in the stock market, the astronomy community has already assimilated the changes that are about to happen when large 6 to 10-meter telescopes are routinely in operation. Gemini is just in the throes of its first commissioning activities, while the first two European VLT telescopes and Subaru have seen first light. They will join the Keck telescopes in a year or so, along with the second Gemini, the other two VLT 8-meters, the Hobby-Eberly 10-meter in Texas, the MMT upgrade, the Magellan telescopes, and the Large Binocular Telescope.
With those observational riches, the community asks why NSF should spend its money on an observatory running two 4-meter telescopes plus some smaller apertures, even if it's a national observatory. We must therefore move aggressively to demonstrate to the world that we remain a uniquely valuable resource.
We are proving our worth by playing to the strengths of our telescopes and our site. We have good seeing, a reasonable fraction of clear skies, and remain relatively dark. Our telescopes were designed to emphasize wide field of view. We will therefore emphasize wide-field imaging and spectroscopy to support and complement the larger aperture facilities. Our wide-field instruments now include Mosaic, Hydra, and ONIS, and we will soon add SQIID and FLAMINGOS. The next generation instruments planned are wide field and high efficiency--the near-IR imager and the next generation optical spectrograph. We can also use the versatility of WIYN to exploit the time dimension by monitoring variables, catching supernovae, and responding quickly to targets of opportunity.
We intend to increase the value of observing at Kitt Peak. One trend is to give more time to major survey projects. The data from such systematic surveys will be valuable for more than one astronomical research project and will be made available to the public on short timescales. In general, we will support larger programs (although fewer of them). In addition, we will investigate the promise of continuity--getting enough time to finish a program that takes more than one year--and explore the connection to support of space missions, such as surveys with the AXAF X-ray telescope and their ground-based follow-ups.
Our trend of operations is therefore longer runs, fewer instrument changes and fewer start-ups. That level of operations will be a much better match to our current staffing level, and our commitment to efficiency and reliability.
We have not abandoned a commitment to an exciting and vigorous future. Kitt Peak is a strong contender for a large-aperture (6.5-8.4 meter), wide-field telescope. Several steps will be required to win a new telescope for our mountain. First, we must present an exciting case to the committees undertaking the decadal survey of astronomy priorities. We must also demonstrate, as we did 40 years ago, that Kitt Peak remains an excellent continental site for new observing facilities. We will continue our systematic seeing measurements, undertake analysis of the SCIDAR data collected in February, begin sky brightness measurements, and re-examine the weather statistics.
In order for Kitt Peak National Observatory to be assured of a vigorous scientific future, we must show immediate willingness to support profound and rapid changes in our operating style. We have two goals for the coming year--to generate near-term excitement for our new scientific roles and to take the first steps down a sure path toward long-term development and renewal. I'm optimistic that we'll achieve both.
Richard Green