The MICADO first light imager for the ELT: overview and current Status

TL;DR

MICADO is a cutting-edge near-infrared imager for the ELT, offering high-resolution imaging and spectroscopy to study exoplanets, galaxies, and black holes, with ongoing development and promising performance.

Contribution

This paper presents the final design, manufacturing status, and performance expectations of MICADO, a first light instrument for the ELT, highlighting lessons learned for future projects.

Findings

MICADO will achieve six times the spatial resolution of JWST.

Most components are in manufacturing and assembly phases.

Performance comparable to JWST in sensitivity.

Abstract

MICADO is a first light instrument for the Extremely Large Telescope (ELT), set to start operating later this decade. It will provide diffraction limited imaging, astrometry, high contrast imaging, and long slit spectroscopy at near-infrared wavelengths. During the initial phase operations, adaptive optics (AO) correction will be provided by its own natural guide star wavefront sensor. In its final configuration, that AO system will be retained and complemented by the laser guide star multi-conjugate adaptive optics module MORFEO (formerly known as MAORY). Among many other things, MICADO will study exoplanets, distant galaxies and stars, and investigate black holes, such as Sagittarius A* at the centre of the Milky Way. After their final design phase, most components of MICADO have moved on to the manufacturing and assembly phase. Here we summarize the final design of the instrument and provide an overview about its current manufacturing status and the timeline. Some lessons learned from the final design review process will be presented in order to help future instrumentation projects to cope with the challenges arising from the substantial differences between projects for 8-10m class telescopes (e.g. ESO-VLT) and the next generation Extremely Large Telescopes (e.g. ESO-ELT). Finally, the expected performance will be discussed in the context of the current landscape of astronomical observatories and instruments. For instance, MICADO will have similar sensitivity as the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), but with six times the spatial resolution.