<245 light-years (ly) distant) and adolescent
(<300 Myr, <115 ly) stars. The latter, older but
closer than the known young associations,
allow our survey to probe within the 5 astronomical units ice line, where it is cold enough
for hydrogen compounds such as water, ammonia, and methane to condense into solid
ice grains. Simulations predict this survey
will discover approximately 50 exoplanets,
increasing the number of exoplanet images
by an order of magnitude, enough for statistical investigations. [More information can be
found at http://planetimager.org/]
Stephen Goodsell is the Instrument Program
Manager at Gemini and located at located at
Oxford University, UK. He can be reached at:
[email protected]
André-Nicolas Chene is the GRACES instrument scientist at Gemini. He can be reached at:
[email protected]
Scot Kleinman is head of the Instrumentation
Program at Gemini. He can be reached at:
[email protected]
There is still much work to be completed
both at Gemini South and among the groups
working on the Verification and Commissioning tasks. This work is due to ramp down towards the end of 2014 and GPI will become
an operational instrument. Given the early
science programs, the GPIES, and the general
2014B observations, it shouldn’t be too long
before GPI discovers its first exoplanet!
For the latest information stay connected to
the Gemini Facebook page.
GMOS: The new, extended red-sensitivity,
Hamamatsu CCDs for the Gemini Multi-Object Spectrograph (GMOS) have now been
delivered from Gemini North — where the
system was developed in conjunction with a
team at the Herzberg Institute of Astrophysics — to Gemini South, where they will soon
be installed. In the coming months, GeminiFocus will provide further information about
this significant project.
SPIE: Several Gemini instrumentation staff
are scheduled to participate in the upcoming
SPIE Astronomical Instrumentation meeting
in Montreal this summer. We look forward to
talking with the conference attendees about
our vision for instrumentation at Gemini
and welcome the opportunity to hear your
thoughts and wants as well.
April 2014
GeminiFocus
15