Circumgalactic Hydrogen-Alpha Spectrograph (CHaS)

CHaS is an IFU spectrograph under commission for MDM observatory 2.4m Hiltner Telescope.

CHaS is an integral field unit (IFU) spectrograph designed to detect very faint H-alpha emission from the CGM. It has a larger grasp than more complex and expensive IFUs developed for bigger telescopes, in addition to having excellent spectral resolution, larger field of view and smaller bandpass, making it an ideal instrument to observe the dynamics of the CGM around relatively nearby galaxies. Our instrument sensitivity allows for detection of low-redshift emission from the CGM, and its high spectral resolution captures the Doppler kinematics of circumgalactic gas with sufficient velocity resolution to distinguish between inflowing and outflowing gas.