DOE OSTI2013
We simulate the performance of a new type of instrument, a Superconducting Multi-Object Spectrograph (SuperMOS), that uses microwave kinetic inductance detectors (MKIDs). MKIDs, a new detector technology, feature good quantum efficiency in the UVOIR, can count individual photons with microsecond timing accuracy, and, like X-ray calorimeters, determine their energy to several percent. The performance of Giga-z, a SuperMOS designed for wide field imaging follow-up observations, is evaluated using simulated observations of the COSMOS mock catalog with an array of 100,000 R{sub 423{sub nm}} = E/{Delta}E = 30 MKID pixels. We compare our results against a simultaneous simulation of LSST observations. In 3 yr on a dedicated 4 m class telescope, Giga-z could observe Almost-Equal-To 2 billion galaxies, yielding a low-resolution spectral energy distribution spanning 350-1350 nm for each; 1000 times the number measured with any currently proposed LSST spectroscopic follow-up, at a fraction of the cost and time. Giga-z would provide redshifts for galaxies up to z Almost-Equal-To 6 with magnitudes m{sub i} {approx}< 25, with accuracy {sigma}{sub {Delta}z/(1+z)} Almost-Equal-To 0.03 for the whole sample, and {sigma}{sub {Delta}z/(1+z)} Almost-Equal-To 0.007 for a select subset. We also find catastrophic failure rates and biases that are consistently lower than for LSST. The added constraint on dark energy parameters for WL + CMB by Giga-z using the FoMSWG default model is equivalent to multiplying the LSST Fisher matrix by a factor of {alpha} = 1.27 (w{sub p} ), 1.53 (w{sub a} ), or 1.98 ({Delta}{gamma}). This is equivalent to multiplying both the LSST coverage area and the training sets by {alpha} and reducing all systematics by a factor of 1/{radical}({alpha}), advantages that are robust to even more extreme models of intrinsic alignment.
79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗