MIRADAS (Mid-resolution InfRAreD Astronomical Spectrograph) is the facility near-infrared multi-object echelle spectrograph for the Gran Telescopio Canarias (GTC) 10.4-meter telescope. MIRADAS operates at spectral resolution R=20,000 over the 1-2.5µm bandpass), and provides multiplexing (up to N=12 targets) and spectro-polarimetry. The MIRADAS consortium includes the University of Florida, Universidad de Barcelona, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias, Institut d'Estudis Espacials de Catalunya and Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico, as well as partners at A-V-S (Spain), New England Optical Systems (USA), and IUCAA (India). MIRADAS completed its Final Design Review in 2015, and in this paper, we review the current status and overall system design for the instrument, with scheduled delivery in 2018. We particularly emphasize key developments in cryogenic robotic probe arms for multiplexing, a macro-slicer mini-IFU, an advanced cryogenic spectrograph optical system, and a SIDECAR-based array control system for the 1x2 HAWAII-2RG detector mosaic.

The Dharma Planet Survey (DPS) aims to monitor about 150 nearby very bright FGKM dwarfs (within 50 pc) during 2016$-$2020 for low-mass planet detection and characterization using the TOU very high resolution optical spectrograph (R$\approx$100,000, 380-900nm). TOU was initially mounted to the 2-m Automatic Spectroscopic Telescope at Fairborn Observatory in 2013-2015 to conduct a pilot survey, then moved to the dedicated 50-inch automatic telescope on Mt. Lemmon in 2016 to launch the survey. Here we report the first planet detection from DPS, a super-Earth candidate orbiting a bright K dwarf star, HD 26965. It is the second brightest star ($V=4.4$ mag) on the sky with a super-Earth candidate. The planet candidate has a mass of 8.47$\pm0.47M_{\rm Earth}$, period of $42.38\pm0.01$ d, and eccentricity of $0.04^{+0.05}_{-0.03}$. This RV signal was independently detected by Diaz et al. (2018), but they could not confirm if the signal is from a planet or from stellar activity. The orbital period of the planet is close to the rotation period of the star (39$-$44.5 d) measured from stellar activity indicators. Our high precision photometric campaign and line bisector analysis of this star do not find any significant variations at the orbital period. Stellar RV jitters modeled from star spots and convection inhibition are also not strong enough to explain the RV signal detected. After further comparing RV data from the star's active magnetic phase and quiet magnetic phase, we conclude that the RV signal is due to planetary-reflex motion and not stellar activity.

The Mid-resolution InfRAreD Astronomical Spectrograph (MIRADAS, a near-infrared multi-object echelle spectrograph operating at spectral resolution R=20,000 over the 1-2.5μm bandpass) was selected by the Gran Telescopio Canarias (GTC) partnership as the next-generation near-infrared spectrograph for the world's largest optical/infrared telescope, and is being developed by an international consortium. The MIRADAS consortium includes the University of Florida, Universidad de Barcelona, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias, and Institut d'Estudis Espacials de Catalunya, as well as probe arm industrial partner A-V-S (Spain), with more than 45 Science Working Group members in 10 institutions primarily in Spain, Mexico, and the USA. In this paper, we review the overall system design and project status for MIRADAS during its early fabrication phase in 2016.

The TOU robotic, compact very high resolution optical spectrograph (R=100,000, 0.38-0.9 microns) has been fully characterized at the 2 meter Automatic Spectroscopy Telescope (AST) at Fairborn Observatory in Arizona during its pilot survey of 12 bright FGK dwarfs in 2015. This instrument has delivered sub m/s Doppler precision for bright reference stars (e.g., 0.7 m/s for Tau Ceti over 60 days) with 5-30 min exposures and 0.7 m/s long-term instrument stability, which is the best performance among all of the known Doppler spectrographs to our knowledge. This performance was achieved by maintaining the instrument in a very high vacuum of 1 micron torr and about 0.5 mK (RMS) long-term temperature stability through an innovative close-loop instrument bench temperature control. It has discovered a 21 Earth-mass planet (P=43days) around a bright K dwarf and confirmed three super-Earth planetary systems, HD 1461, 190360 and HD 219314. This instrument will be used to conduct the Dharma Planet Survey (DPS) in 2016-2019 to monitor ~100 nearby very bright FGK dwarfs (most of them brighter than V=8) at the dedicated 50-inch Robotic Telescope on Mt. Lemmon. With very high RV precision and high cadence (~100 observations per target randomly spread over 450 days), a large number of rocky planets, including possible habitable ones, are expected to be detected. The survey also provides the largest single homogenous high precision RV sample of nearby stars for studying low mass planet populations and constraining various planet formation models. Instrument on-sky performance is summarized.

In the new era of searching for Earth-like planets, new generation radial velocity (RV) high resolution spectrographs requires ~0.1 m/s Doppler calibration accuracy in the visible band and a similar calibration precision in the near infrared. The patented stable monolithic Michelson interferometer filtered source called the Sine source emerges as a very promising calibration device. This Sine source has the potential of covering the practical working wavelengths (~0.38- 2.5 μm) for Doppler measurements with high resolution optical and near infrared high resolution spectrographs at the ground-based telescopes. The single frame calibration precision can reach < 0.1 m/s for the state of the art spectrographs, and it can be easily designed to match the intrinsic sensitivities of future Doppler instruments. The Sine source also has the great practical advantages in compact (portable) size and low cost. Here we report early results from on-sky calibration of a Sine source measured with two state-of-the-art TOU optical high resolution spectrograph (R=100,000, 0.38-0.9 microns) and FIRST near infrared spectrograph (R=50,000, 0.8-1.8 microns) at a 2 meter robotic telescope at Fairborn Observatory in Arizona. The results with the TOU spectrograph monitoring over seven days show that the Sine source has produced ~3 times better calibration precision than the ThAr calibration (RMS = 2.7m/s vs. 7.4m/s) at 0.49-0.62 microns where calibration data have been processed by our preliminary data pipeline and ~1.4 times better than the iodine absorption spectra (RMS=3.6 m/s) at the same wavelength region. As both ThAr and Iodine have reached sub m/s calibration accuracy with existing Doppler instruments (such as HARPS and HIRES), it is likely that the sine source would provide similar improvement once a better data pipeline and an upgraded version of a Sine source are developed. It is totally possible to reach ~0.1 m/s in the optical wavelength region. In addition, this Sine source offers potential very accurate calibration at 0.7-0.9 μm where ThAr lines are totally dominated by strong and saturated Argon lines and the ThAr calibration data are nearly useless. The early measurements with the FIRST near infrared spectrograph show that this Sine source produces very homogenous fringe modulations over 0.8-1.8 μm which can potentially provide better precision than the UrNe lamp for instrument drift measurements.

One of the most astonishing results from the HARPS and Kepler planet surveys is the recent discovery of close-in super-Earths orbiting more than half of FGKM dwarfs. This new population of exoplanets represents the most dominant class of planetary systems known to date, is totally unpredicted by the classical core-accretion disk planet formation model. High cadence and high precision Doppler spectroscopy is the key to characterize properties of this new population and constrain planet formation models. A new robotic, compact high resolution optical spectrograph, called TOU (formerly called EXPERT-III), was commissioned at the Automatic Spectroscopic Telescope (AST) at Fairborn Observatory in Arizona in July 2013 and has produced a spectral resolution of about 100,000 and simultaneous wavelength coverage of 0.38-0.9 μm with a 4kx4k back-illuminated Fairchild CCD detector. The instrument holds a very high vacuum of 1 micro torr and about 2 mK temperature stability over a month. The early on-sky RV measurements show that this instrument is approaching a Doppler precision of 1 m/s (rms) for bright reference stars (such as Tau Ceti) with 5 min exposures and better than 3 m/s (P-V, RMS~1 m/s) daily RV stability before calibration exposures are applied. A pilot survey of 20 V<9 FGK dwarfs, including known super-Earth systems and known RV stable stars, is being launched and every star will be observed ~100 times over ~300 days time window between this summer and next spring, following up with a full survey of ~150 V< 10 FGKM dwarfs in 2015-2017.

High resolution infrared spectroscopy has been a major challenging task to accomplish in astronomy due to the enormous size and cost of IR spectrographs built with traditional gratings. A silicon immersion grating, due to its over three times high dispersion over a traditional reflective grating, offers a compact and low cost design of new generation IR high resolution spectrographs. Here we report the on-sky performance of the first silicon immersion grating spectrometer, called Florida IR Silicon immersion grating spectromeTer (FIRST), commissioned at the 2-meter Automatic Spectroscopic Telescope (AST) of Fairborn Observatory in Arizona in October 2013. The measured spectral resolution is R=50,000 with a 50 mm diameter spectrograph pupil and a blaze angle of 54.7 degree. The 1.4-1.8 m wavelength region (the Red channel) is completely covered in a single exposure with a 2kx2k H2RG IR array while the 0.8-1.35 μm region is nearly completely covered by the cross-dispersed echelle mode (the Blue channel) at R=50,000 in a single exposure. The instrument is operated in a high vacuum (about 1 micro torr) and cryogenic temperatures (the bench at 189K and the detector at 87K) and with a precise temperature control. It is primarily used for high precision Doppler measurements (~3 m/s) of low mass M dwarf stars for the identification and characterization of extrasolar planets. A plan for a high cadence and high precision survey of habitable super-Earths around ~150 nearby M dwarfs and a major upgrade with integral field unit low resolution spectroscopy are also introduced.

The Mid-resolution InfRAreD Astronomical Spectrograph (MIRADAS, a near-infrared multi-object echelle spectrograph operating at spectral resolution R=20,000 over the 1-2.5 mu m bandpass) was selected in 2010 by the Gran Telescopio Canarias (GTC) partnership as the next-generation near-infrared spectrograph for the world's largest optical/infrared telescope, and is being developed by an international consortium. The MIRADAS consortium includes the University of Florida, Universidad de Barcelona, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Instituto de Astrofisica de Canarias, Institut de Fisica d'Altes Energies, Institut d'Estudis Espacials de Catalunya and Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico, as well as probe arm industrial partner A-V-S (Spain). In this paper, we review the overall system design for MIRADAS, as it nears Preliminary Design Review in the autumn of 2012.

This paper is to report the design and performance of a very high Doppler precision cross-dispersed echelle spectrograph, EXtremely high Precision ExtrasolaR planet Tracker III (EXPERT-III), as part of a global Exoplanet Tracker (ET) network. The ET network is designed to hunt low mass planets, especially habitable rocky planets, around GKM dwarfs. It has an extremely high spectral resolution (EHR) mode of R=110,000 and a high resolution (HR) mode of R=56,000 and can simultaneously cover 0.38-0.9 mu m with a 4kx4k back-illuminated Fairchild CCD detector with a single exposure. EXPERT-III is optimized for high throughput by using two-prisms cross-disperser and a large core diameter fiber (2 arcsec on sky, or 80 mu m at f/4) to collect photons from the Kitt Peak National Observatory (KPNO) 2.1m telescope. The average overall detection efficiency is similar to 6% from above the atmosphere to the detector for the EHR Mode and about 11% for the HR mode. The extremely high spectral resolution in a compact design (the spectrograph dimension, 1.34x0.8x0.48 m) is realized by coupling the single input 80 mu m telescope fiber into four 40 mu m fibers and re-arranging the four small core diameter fibers into a linear fiber slit array (a one-to-four fiber image slicer). EXPERT-III is operated in a vacuum chamber with temperature controlled to similar to 2 milli-Kelvin rms for an extended period of time. The radial velocity (RV) drift is controlled to within 10 meters/second (m/s) over a month. EXPERT-III can reach a photon noise limited RV measurement precision of similar to 0.3 m/s for a V=8 mag GKM type dwarf with small rotation (vsini = 2 km/s) in a 15 min exposure. EXPERT-III's RV measurement uncertainties for bright stars are primarily limited by the Thorium-Argon (ThAr) calibration source (similar to 0.5 m/s). EXPERT-III will serve as an excellent public accessible high resolution optical spectroscope facility at the KPNO 2.1m telescope.This instrument along with other EXPERT instruments (EXPERT and LiJET) will be used for time sensitive extremely high precision Doppler measurements such as hunting for rocky planets and studying stellar oscillations. Our planned rocky planet survey will primarily target habitable zone (HZ) rocky planets around K0-M4 dwarfs. A combination of the ET network HZ planet survey in the optical wavelengths with the FIRST HZ planet survey around M4-M9 dwarfs in the near IR wavelengths (Ge et al. 2012a) will give us a broad view of HZ planets around low mass stars for the first time. The overall planet sample will substantially increase the power for statistical study of planet occurrence and properties and constraining on planet formation models and physical conditions around low mass (0.2-0.8 M-circle dot) stars. The ET network will also be used for following up planet candidates from the SDSS-III Multi-object APO Radial Velocity Exoplanet Large-area Survey (MARVELS) and space missions (such as Kepler).

This paper describes an apparatus for testing the erosion rate of erodible rock and stiff clay as a function of water-flow-induced shear stress. The device, referred to as the Rotating Erosion Testing Apparatus, or RETA, is similar in design to other devices but has a number of advantages. The RETA uses a real-time control unit that monitors the shear stress via the torque imparted to the sample and adjusts its rotational speed to maintain a nearly constant shear stress throughout the test. RETA test results have been used to estimate local sediment erosion rates at structures founded in these types of bed materials.

We report the system design and predicted performance of the Florida IR Silicon immersion grating spectromeTer (FIRST). This new generation cryogenic IR spectrograph offers broad-band high resolution IR spectroscopy with R=72,000 at 1.4-1.8 μm and R=60,000 at 0.8-1.35 μm in a single exposure with a 2kx2k H2RG IR array. It is enabled by a compact design using an extremely high dispersion silicon immersion grating (SIG) and an R4 echelle with a 50 mm diameter pupil in combination with an Image Slicer. This instrument is operated in vacuum with temperature precisely controlled to reach long term stability for high precision radial velocity (RV) measurements of nearby stars, especially M dwarfs and young stars. The primary technical goal is to reach better than 4 m/s long term RV precision with J<9 M dwarfs within 30 min exposures. This instrument is scheduled to be commissioned at the Tennessee State University (TSU) 2-m Automatic Spectroscopic Telescope (AST) at Fairborn Observatory in spring 2013. FIRST can also be used for observing transiting planets, young stellar objects (YSOs), magnetic fields, binaries, brown dwarfs (BDs), ISM and stars. We plan to launch the FIRST NIR M dwarf planet survey in 2014 after FIRST is commissioned at the AST. This NIR M dwarf survey is the first large-scale NIR high precision Doppler survey dedicated to detecting and characterizing planets around 215 nearby M dwarfs with J< 10. Our primary science goal is to look for habitable Super-Earths around the late M dwarfs and also to identify transiting systems for follow-up observations with JWST to measure the planetary atmospheric compositions and study their habitability. Our secondary science goal is to detect and characterize a large number of planets around M dwarfs to understand the statistics of planet populations around these low mass stars and constrain planet formation and evolution models. Our survey baseline is expected to detect ~30 exoplanets, including 10 Super Earths, within 100 day periods. About half of the Super-Earths are in their habitable zones and one of them may be a transiting planet. The AST, with its robotic control and ease of switching between instruments (in seconds), enables great flexibility and efficiency, and enables an optimal strategy, in terms of schedule and cadence, for this NIR M dwarf planet survey.

We report design, performance and early results from two of the Extremely High Precision Extrasolar Planet Tracker Instruments (EXPERT) as part of a global network for hunting for low mass planets in the next decade. EXPERT is a combination of a thermally compensated monolithic Michelson interferometer and a cross-dispersed echelle spectrograph for extremely high precision Doppler measurements for nearby bright stars (e.g., 1m/s for a V=8 solar type star in 15 min exposure). It has R=18,000 with a 72 micron slit and a simultaneous coverage of 390-694 nm. The commissioning results show that the instrument has already produced a Doppler precision of about 1 m/s for a solar type star with S/N similar to 100 per pixel. The instrument has reached similar to 4 mK (P-V) temperature stability, similar to 1 mpsi pressure stability over a week and a total instrument throughput of similar to 30% at 550 nm from the fiber input to the detector. EXPERT also has a direct cross-dispersed echelle spectroscopy mode fed with 50 micron fibers. It has spectral resolution of R=27,000 and a simultaneous wavelength coverage of 390-1000 nm.