High Resolution On-Chip Photonic MKID Spectrometer

High resolution spectrographs with spectral resolution R = lambda;/∆lambda; gt; 5,000 are one of the most important tools for nearly every discipline in astronomy, but the design of high resolution spectrographs have not experienced significant changes in last several decades. A conventional high resolution spectrograph usually contains a collimator, echelle grating, cross disperser, and finally a camera and science detectormdash;both typically semiconductor detectors. Here we propose developing a spectrometer where the light is separated and channelized by a photonic circuit and is then detected by an energy-resolving superconducting detector. The instrument would be a radicalnbsp; new type of high resolution spectrograph applicable for both multiobject and integral field unit (IFU) spectroscopy and other fiber fed light applications. Our goal is to create a high resolution multi-object spectrograph by marrying two breakthrough technologies, ultra-low loss arrayed waveguide gratings (AWG) and Microwave Kinetic Inductance Detectors, or MKIDs. MKIDs can determine the energy of each arriving photon without read noise or dark current, and with high temporal resolution. The AWG allows us to disperse light from the telescope, in a compact way and to position the dispersed light into numerous output channels which we can conveniently position (i.e. dispersed not just by the angle at which it diffracts off a prism or grating). The MKID allows us to distinguish between the orders in the disperse light contained within the channels, eliminated the need for a cross-disperser. In other words, the energy resolution of the MKID allows us to determine from which echelle order the photon came.