Full-disk Synoptic Observations of the Chromosphere Using H$_{\alpha}$ Telescope at the Kodaikanal Observatory

TL;DR

This paper describes the installation, specifications, and initial observations of a new full-disk H-alpha solar telescope at Kodaikanal Observatory, enabling detailed chromospheric imaging and spectral scans.

Contribution

It introduces a new solar telescope with advanced imaging and spectral capabilities, providing a valuable tool for chromospheric studies at Kodaikanal.

Findings

Successful installation and calibration of the telescope.

First preliminary observations demonstrating its capabilities.

Potential for detailed chromospheric research.

Abstract

This paper reports on the installation and observations of a new solar telescope installed on 7th October, 2014 at the Kodaikanal Observatory. The telescope is a refractive type equipped with a tunable Lyot H$_{\alpha}$ filter. A CCD camera of 2k$\times$2k size makes the image of the Sun with a pixel size of 1.21$^{\prime\prime}$ pixel$^{-1}$ with a full field-of-view of 41$^{\prime}$. The telescope is equipped with a guiding system which keeps the image of the Sun within a few pixels throughout the observations. The FWHM of the Lyot filter is 0.4\AA~and the filter is motorized, capable of scanning the H$_{\alpha}$ line profile at a smaller step size of 0.01\AA. Partial-disk imaging covering about 10$^{\prime}$, is also possible with the help of a relay lens kept in front of the CCD camera. In this paper, we report the detailed specifications of the telescope, filter unit, its installation, observations and the procedures we have followed to calibrate and align the data. We also present preliminary results with this new full-disk telescope.