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SHARK-NIR is a near-infrared (0.96 μm to 1.7 μm) instrument proposed for the Large Binocular Telescope (LBT) in the framework of the “2014 Call for Proposals for Instrument Upgrades and New Instrument" (Farinato et al. 2014).
Once installed on the left side of the central Gregorian focal station of the LBT, coupled with its visible counterpart SHARK-VIS (on the right side), it will enable to exploit unique challenging science, including exoplanet and extragalactic science cases. SHARK will provide simultaneous spectral coverage from B to H band, taking advantage of the outstanding performance of LBT binocular Extreme Adaptive Optics (XAO) capability. The XAO features two Adaptive Secondary Mirrors (ASM) and pyramid wavefront sensors. Moreover, the SOUL upgrade will allow to reach unprecedent sensitivity in the faint-end regime.
INAF-Padua is the lead institution of a consortium formed by other INAF Observatories, such as Rome, Arcetri, Milan, Trieste, Brera, Catania, Palermo and Turin. The collaboration also includes the Steward Observatory (SO) of Tucson, University of Arizona (USA), The Max Planck Institute fur Astronomie (MPIA) of Heidelberg (Germany) and the Institut de Planétologie et d’Astrophysique de Grenoble (IPAG), in France.
The project is now in the AIV phase at the clean room of the Padova Observatory, where the optical and mechanical components are being integrated on the SHARK-NIR optical bench and the final performance of the instrument's coronagraphy subsystem is being tested. Its first light is foreseen by the end of 2021.
INAF-OAPd researchers are leading an international team in the development of the PSF-Reconstruction (PSF-R) software package for the MICADO instrument. The Multi-AO Imaging Camera for Deep Observations (MICADO), one of the first-light instruments for the Extremely Large Telescope of the European Southern Observatory, will provide the future largest telescope of the world with imaging and spectroscopic capabilities. It will observe in the IR, from I to K band (0.8-2.4 micron). And will benefit from the real-time correction of the optical turbulence and telescope residual aberrations provided by state-of-the-art Single Conjugate Adaptive Optics (SCAO) and Multi-Conjugate Adaptive Optics (MCAO, MAORY) systems. The current schedule foresees the instrument completed and mounted on the ELT in 2025 and fully commissioned by 2027.
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