Author: oscarmoons

Last week, the MOONS team at UKATC fitted all the fixed optics into their mounts and subsystems. This is an exciting milestone towards the full assembly of the instrument! The two fixed optics assemblies inside MOONS splits the light up to the three cameras on each side of the main bench. It does this using … Continue reading Installing the Fixed Optics

The first test "lift and fit" of the fixed optics in MOONS cryostat has been successfully completed last week by the team at UKATC. The activity is being led by our optical engineer Martin Black. As with everything on this project the pieces of glass are large, and in turn, so are the parts needed to hold them. Fully … Continue reading Lifting and fitting fixed optics

After a shutdown in operations at the end of March due to the pandemic, the MOONS Cambridge team working on camera assembling, testing and alignment is now back in action, already making excellent progress (and sharing impressive photos!). After access to the clean room for the first time (with some restrictions) in mid-July, the team … Continue reading Cooling down of MOONS cameras!

All the parts for the MOONS Rotating Front End Structure, after manufacturing by CUNHOL (Portugal), are now at the IA (Lisbon) MOONS integration room and the entire main structure, including its retraction and screen mechanisms, have been fully integrated. The MOONS rotating front-end is a large assembly that will be mounted on the VLT Nasmyth rotator … Continue reading The powerful rotating front-end

A new milestone towards the MOONS completion has been achieved with the manufacturing and delivery of the high-resolution H-band silicon prisms. These large optical components, considered one of the main challenges of the instrument design due to their size and surface quality requirements, were designed by the INAF team in Arcetri, Florence. After a lengthy … Continue reading HR-H silicon prisms in the house