Abstract
Presented at 2006 AAS Meeting in Washington, D.C.
A low-resolution, inexpensive 38º astronomical spectrograph was previously constructed for amateur research. Inspired by designs and theory developed by Christian Buil of France, the design had a resolution of 700, with a spectral range of about 2000 A Spectra were taken of various stars and nebulae.
To investigate the feasibility of identification of minerals and organic compounds on planetary systems, a Raman head was built for the above spectrograph. The Raman head used a 5320 A, 5 mW laser, a laser-line filter, a low-pass barrier filter, and a dichroic mirror. A procedure for alignment of the optics was developed. A successful configuration was finally found that used a 48 mm focal length microscope objective to focus the laser light to the sample, as well as pickup the Stokes backscattering. Raman spectra of standards were observed with excellent correlation to published wavenumbers.
A Littrow configuration spectrograph was then constructed to give better resolution. The Littrow configuration reduced the weight since only one 200 mm focal length lens was required. A 6x7 cm format surplus film camera lens was used as a combined collimator and camera lens. The resolution with a 1200 l/mm grating was about 6500, with a 800 A spectral range. It is planned that the Littrow spectrograph will be used to verify Doppler shifts of emission-line stars.
I would like to thank the AAS, the IAPPP, the National Science Foundation, Chroma Corporation, Santa Barbara Instrument Group, and my parents.
Please send questions or comments to marymast@gmail.com
Last updated June 15, 2006