Wide-Field Imaging Spectroscopy in the Submillimeter: Deploying SPIFI on AST/RO

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0094605StaceyThe proposed work will integrate a new direct detection imaging spectrometer (SPIFI = South Pole Imaging Fabry-Perot Interferometer) into an existing telescope at South Pole station, in order to study the physical conditions, dynamics, and composition of the interstellar medium and its relationship to star formation in galaxies. SPIFI is designed for use in the far-infrared and sub-millimeter windows available to the 1.7 m Antarctic Submillimeter Telescope and Remote Observatory (AST/RO) at the South Pole; it has been tested in similar windows at the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope on Mauna Kea in Hawaii. SPIFI's detector is a 5 x 5 element array of monolithic silicon bolometers cooled to 0.06 deg K in an adiabatic demagnetization refrigerator. The current version of the instrument can be tuned to any frequency in the 350 micron window, and continuously scan 13 spectral resolution elements at any given wavelength. SPIFI will be used to study the excitation conditions of molecular, photodissociated, and ionized interstellar matter in the so-called central molecular zone of the galaxy; the physical condition of interstellar matter in nearby galaxies, and the low metalicity environment of the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds to see whether these mimic protogalaxies - a key to understanding the star formation process in the early universe.***