FALCON: a concept to extend adaptive optics corrections to cosmological fields

Abstract

FALCON is an original concept for a next generation spectrograph at ESO VLT or at future ELTs. It is a spectrograph including multiple small integral field units (IFUs) which can be deployed within a large field of view such as that of VLT/GIRAFFE. In FALCON, each IFU features an adaptive optics correction using off-axis natural reference stars in order to combine, in the 0.8 - 1.8 μm wavelength range, spatial and spectral resolutions (0.1 - 0.15 arcsec and R = 1000 +/- 5000). These conditions are ideally suited for distant galaxy studies, which should be done within fields of view larger than the galaxy clustering scales (4 - 9 Mpc), i.e. foV > 100 arcmin. Instead of compensating the whole field, the adaptive correction will be performed locally on each IFU. This implies to use small miniaturized devices both for adaptive optics correction and wavefront sensing. Applications to high latitude fields imply to use atmospheric tomography because the stars required for wavefront sensing will be in most of the cases far outside the isoplanatic patch.