Letters of Intent received in 2015

LoI 2017-277
The World of Spectroscopy in the Era of Large Surveys and ELTs

Topics

The new environment for spectroscopy:
- Large-scale surveys with uniform datasets: both imaging and
spectroscopic
- Ground-based ELTs
- Networked smaller telescopes across longitudes
- New large space telescopes (e.g., High-Definition Space Telescope (HDST))
- New generations of UV, optical, and IR detectors

Science goals for spectroscopy:
- Cosmology
- Galaxy Evolution
- The local universe (resolved stellar populations)
- Galactic archaeology
- Stellar physics
- Exoplanets
- The solar system
- Transients across the universe: from reionization to
near-Earth objects

Advances in instrumentation to realize science goals:
- Wide-field diffraction-limited imaging to support multi-object spectroscopy
- IFUs and IFSs
- Improving spectrograph throughput
- The evolution of spectroscopic instrumentation at 8-10m telescopes
- Spectroscopy on a budget: production-line devices for smaller telescopes
- Coronagraphic spectrographs

Rationale

The discoveries and achievements of astronomy in recent years have been
breathtaking and led to an increasingly rich and interconnected understanding
of our universe. With this already complex view of the cosmos, we are in
the midst of a revolution in sheer information content, with large-scale
surveys underway and planned, as well as new facilities under planning,
design, or construction that will probe to unprecedented limits in flux
sensitvity or angular resolution. Although current and future surveys, using
both ground-based and space-based telescopes, rely on a mixture of imaging
and spectroscopic instrumentation, it is through spectroscopy that much
insight is gained into the the underlying physics of the objects or processes
under observation.

This symposium will focus on astronomical spectroscopy and outline the
scientific goals that motivate both current surveys, as well as future surveys
and observational facilities. The scientific goals will be used to frame
a discussion of the current state of the art in the technical aspects of
spectrograph design and construction, and point to where there may significant
improvements over the next decade. Future spectroscopic capabilities will be
mapped onto what will be needed to complement future surveys, such as TESS,
LSST, WFIRST, EUCLID, or Plato.