The Photonic TIGER: a multicore fiber-fed spectrograph

TL;DR

This paper introduces the Photonic TIGER, a compact, high-resolution fiber-fed spectrograph using a 2D multicore array input, demonstrating its feasibility and potential for small-scale integral field spectrographs.

Contribution

It presents a novel multicore fiber-fed spectrograph design with a 2D array input, achieving high resolution and compactness for IR applications.

Findings

Achieved a resolving power of R~31000 in the IR

Demonstrated a 7-core spectrograph with 8 nm bandwidth

Explored architectures for small, diffraction-limited integral field spectrographs

Abstract

We present a proof of concept compact diffraction limited high-resolution fiber-fed spectrograph by using a 2D multicore array input. This high resolution spectrograph is fed by a 2D pseudo-slit, the Photonic TIGER, a hexagonal array of near-diffraction limited single-mode cores. We study the feasibility of this new platform related to the core array separation and rotation with respect to the dispersion axis. A 7 core compact Photonic TIGER fiber-fed spectrograph with a resolving power of around R~31000 and 8 nm bandwidth in the IR centered on 1550 nm is demonstrated. We also describe possible architectures based on this concept for building small scale compact diffraction limited Integral Field Spectrographs (IFS).