Mapping the aberrations of a wide-field spectrograph using a photonic comb.

We demonstrate a new approach to calibrating the spectral-spatial response of a wide-field spectrograph using a fibre etalon comb. Conventional wide-field instruments employed on front-line telescopes are mapped with a grid of diffraction-limited holes cut into a focal plane mask. The aberrated grid pattern in the image plane typically reveals n-symmetric (e.

Interstellar medium. Pseudo-three-dimensional maps of the diffuse interstellar band at 862 nm.

The diffuse interstellar bands (DIBs) are absorption lines observed in visual and near-infrared spectra of stars. Understanding their origin in the interstellar medium is one of the oldest problems in astronomical spectroscopy, as DIBs have been known since 1922. In a completely new approach to understanding DIBs, we combined information from nearly 500,000 stellar spectra obtained by the massive spectroscopic survey RAVE (Radial Velocity Experiment) to produce the first pseudo-three-dimensional map of the strength of the DIB at 8620 angstroms covering the nearest 3 kiloparsecs from the Sun, and show that it follows our independently constructed spatial distribution of extinction by interstellar dust along the Galactic plane.