What could KIDSpec, a new MKID spectrograph, do on the ELT?

TL;DR

KIDSpec, a new MKID spectrograph, could enable high-quality optical/near-infrared spectroscopy of faint and short-lived astronomical sources on ELT-class telescopes, significantly advancing observational capabilities.

Contribution

This paper introduces KIDSpec, a novel MKID-based spectrograph, and demonstrates through simulation its potential to observe very faint objects with high spectral resolution on ELT-class telescopes.

Findings

KIDSpec can observe a magnitude 24 object with SNR 5 in 10 seconds.

Simulation shows KIDSpec's potential for follow-up of LSST and LISA sources.

KIDSpec's energy and time resolution benefits short and faint observations.

Abstract

Microwave Kinetic Inductance Detectors (MKIDs) are beginning to become more prominent in astronomical instrumentation, due to their sensitivity, low noise, high pixel count for superconducting detectors, and inherent energy and time resolving capability. The Kinetic Inductance Detector Spectrometer (KIDSpec) will take advantage of these features, KIDSpec is a medium resolution MKID spectrograph for the optical/near infrared. KIDSpec will contribute to many science areas particularly those involving short and/or faint observations. When short period binary systems are found, typical CCD detectors will struggle to characterise these systems due to the very short exposures required, causing errors as large as the estimated parameter itself. The KIDSpec Simulator (KSIM) has been developed to investigate how much KIDSpec could improve on this. KIDSpec was simulated on an ELT class telescope to find the extent of its potential, and it was found that KIDSpec could observe a $m_{V}\approx{24}$ with an SNR of 5 for a 10s exposure at 1420 spectral resolution. This would mean that KIDSpec on an ELT class telescope could spectroscopically follow up on any LSST photometric discoveries of LISA verification sources.