I am truly grateful for the opportunity to lead the program of Kitt Peak as Director. Kitt Peak is a vital Observatory on a competitive site, with a flagship modern telescope in WIYN, the powerful and versatile Mayall 4-m, a dedicated and talented staff, and world-class instrumentation. We are currently positioning the Observatory for its long-term role as an indispensable part of NOAO in its 21st century operations.
I recently accompanied AURA's Observatories Council on a visit to the mountain. Lee Anne Willson's reaction to that visit reflects feelings throughout our community: We are so engrossed in long-term budget problems we can easily forget what an exciting place Kitt Peak is. The WIYN Telescope provides image quality near that of the site-delivered seeing night after night. Phoenix is opening a new volume of space to study at high dispersion in the near-infrared. The 8K square CCD Mosaic imager should have thinned chips installed within a year. It gives a field of view not available since the days of photographic plates.
Where are we headed? Within five years, the limiting faint object work that has been done on the 4-m will migrate to Gemini. The impact on the current pattern of usage of Kitt Peak facilities will be profound. We need only look at the near absence of requests for high-dispersion quasar absorption line observations on the 4-m echelle since the advent of Keck HIRES to appreciate the case in point. Kitt Peak must offer the capabilities to prepare for Gemini observing, to complement Gemini programs by covering the bright end of samples with a range of fluxes, and by supporting those programs that do not require large aperture to achieve forefront results.
Scientific opportunity must drive the range of capabilities that Kitt Peak offers to its users. The diversity of the community's interests has always been reflected in the variety of programs supported on the mountain. At the same time, we can discern some major themes in the direction of our discipline. These include the evolution of galaxies, the early phases of star formation, and stellar populations, among others.
What capabilities do we envision? Kitt Peak will work actively with its WIYN partners to keep that telescope meeting its potential. A rapid image compensation system is a high priority. Expanding Hydra's grasp to the non-thermal infrared is an exciting prospect.
The Mayall telescope will deliver deep, moderate field imaging at prime focus. It will be the vehicle for near-infrared spectroscopy and high-throughput optical spectroscopy. It also could be used to push high-dispersion spectroscopy to fainter limits.
Today we use surveys on 1-m class telescopes to isolate samples of objects requiring spectroscopic follow-up on the 4-m. For our future access to 8m and 10m telescopes, that survey capability must be scaled up to a 2-m class instrument. That size aperture is necessary and sufficient to fill the gap between the 2MASS and Sloan Sky Surveys and the flux limits to which the large-aperture telescopes can make spectroscopic measurements. I am committed to carrying out the Users Committee recommendation that we vigorously pursue the option of a new 2.4-m imaging telescope for Kitt Peak. The beginning of the process is to hear from you about the need for observations made at this aperture as the Gemini telescopes become available.
Our budget history is no secret, and we are all painfully aware of the changes taking place in the suite of apertures available to us. Please see Sidney Wolff's discussion of the near-term plans for the NOAO share of the Burrell Schmidt and the Coudé Feed. The good news is that the 0.9m with the CCD Mosaic Imager provides such a unique capability for wide-field imaging with adequate PSF sampling that we will make every effort to keep that facility operating as long as our budget permits. I intend to pursue two approaches to compensating for the loss of telescope nights that closures of small aperture telescopes represent. One is to explore a wider variety of scheduling options, to take advantage of the greater data gathering efficiency provided by highly multiplexed, efficient instrumentation. The other is to be available to encourage community coordination of the substantial number of 1-m class telescopes now in use.
Our advisors and concerned users ask the same reasonable question: What will you do with the relatively modest amount of money that you save from not operating these useful small telescopes? My answer is that the savings have already been taken in previous staff reductions, and that the current staff is stretched well beyond reasonable expectations for their service. This condition jeopardizes morale. Our management approach will be to match the level of support effort more closely to the ability of our dedicated teams to meet their demands. We will still actively seek new ways of approaching those tasks more efficiently, to minimize losses in productivity of our working telescopes. I rely on the skill and dedication of our management team, Bruce Bohannan, Tony Abraham, John Dunlop, and Bob Barnes, in realizing these goals.
Kitt Peak is currently a vital observatory. No one can predict with certainty the outcome of the longer-term countervailing trends at the national level: the commitment to support of basic research versus the drive to balance the federal budget. I am committed to working with you and the Kitt Peak staff to maximize our opportunity to produce forefront science with the resources available to us.
Richard Green