New developments in integral field spectroscopy

The field of integral field spectroscopy is approaching maturity with a large range of devices built or under construction. The integral field unit (IFU) of the GEMINI Multiobject Spectrographs (GMOS) is currently being developed by the Durham Astronomical Instrumentation Group (AIG). This gives 0.2 arcsec sampling over a field exceeding 60 square arcseconds. A prototype has been built for the near-infrared which is now in operation at UKIRT and another instrument using fibre-lenslet technology is under construction for use with Adaptive Optics systems at the Herschel telescope in La Palma. The next generation of integral field spectrographs will address yet more ambitious targets which arise from opportunities presented by the new ground-based and space-borne telescopes. Foremost among these is the desire to (a) obtain finer spatial resolution so as to exploit the excellent images available from AO and space telescopes; (b) exploit the thermal infrared, in order to understand the evolution of galaxies at very high redshift; and (c) to provide a multiplexed integral field capability. Realisation of these requirements will, most likely, involve a combination of fibre-lenslet and image-slicer technology.