DECam -A New Wide Field Imager on the Blanco 4m Telescope

1. DECam -A New Wide Field Imager on the Blanco 4m Telescope DECAM is a powerful new instrument for a classic telescope. It replaces the entire prime focus cage of the Blanco 4m telescope at CTIO DECam consists of a 520 megapixel CCD camera, a low noise read-out system, an 8 slot filter changer and high speed shutter, a wide field optical corrector with a 2.2 degree field of view, and a hexapod alignment and focus system. The pixel size is .27 arcsec/15mm Text Other features are a 17 second readout time, on-focal plane alignment and focus CCDs and a community pipeline. Filter changer mechanism Community Use DECam will be an observatory instrument available to the astronomical community via the NOAO proposal process. For the individual investigator DECam presents an order of magnitude increase in reach over the MOSAIC II, the current Blanco instrument. There will be a community pipeline to provide the individual investigator with astronomy ready images and preliminary catalogs 1 www.darkenergysurvey.org

2. Focal plane C4 Filters & Shutter C2 -C3 • LBNL Design: • fully depleted, 250 micron thick • backside illuminated • p-channel on n-type • 15 micron pixels, 0.27”/pixel • QE> 50% in z-band (825-1100nm) • Read noise < 10 e- @ 250 kpix/sec • Holland, S. et al. IEEE Trans. Elec. Dev., 50, 225 (2003) Text C1 DECam system provided to NSF for community use by the DOE, STFC (UK), Ministry of Education and Science (Spain), FINEP (Brazil), and the Collaborating Institutions; Fermilab, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, University of Chicago, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, National Optical Astronomy Observatory, Spain DES Collaboration, United Kingdom DES Collaboration, University of Michigan, DES-Brazil Consortium, University of Pennsylvania, Argonne National Laboratory, Ohio State University, and Santa Cruz-SLAC-Stanford DES Consortium www.darkenergysurvey.org