The Solar eruptioN Integral Field Spectrograph
astro-ph.SR
/ Authors
Vicki L. Herde, Phillip C. Chamberlin, Don Schmit, Adrian Daw, Ryan O. Milligan, Vanessa Polito, Souvik Bose, Spencer Boyajian, Paris Buedel, Will Edgar
and 10 more authors
Alex Gebben, Qian Gong, Ross Jacobsen, Nicholas Nell, Bennet Schwab, Alan Sims, David Summers, Zachary Turner, Trace Valade, Joseph Wallace
/ Abstract
The Solar eruptioN Integral Field Spectrograph (SNIFS) is a solar-gazing spectrograph scheduled to fly in the summer of 2025 on a NASA sounding rocket. Its goal is to view the solar chromosphere and transition region at a high cadence (1s) both spatially (0.5") and spectrally (33 mÅ) viewing wavelengths around Lyman Alpha (1216 Å), Si iii (1206 Å) and O v (1218 Å) to observe spicules, nanoflares, and possibly a solar flare. This time cadence will provide yet-unobserved detail about fast-changing features of the Sun. The instrument is comprised of a Gregorian-style reflecting telescope combined with a spectrograph via a specialized mirrorlet array that focuses the light from each spatial location in the image so that it may be spectrally dispersed without overlap from neighboring locations. This paper discusses the driving science, detailed instrument and subsystem design, and pre-integration testing of the SNIFS instrument.