NIKA

The New IRAM KIDs Array (NIKA) is a Kinetic Inductance Detectors camera for bolometric observations at the IRAM 30m telescope. NIKA has been built by the Institut Néel (IN), in Grenoble, France under the lead of Alain Benoit, and with the contributions of other persons forming the NIKA collaboration. In 2013 the main contributing institutes are IN, IRAM, IPAG, LPSC, AIG Cardiff.

Overview

NIKA is a dual band instrument using few hundreds of Kinetic Inductance Detectors (KID). The KID resonances variations which are dependent on the incoming power are probed by a comb of tones allowing to perform frequency domain multiplexing. Being a prototype in constant evolution the arrays characteristics (number of pixels, field of view, sensitivity, etc.) have evolved over the years from each test run to the other. The main characteristics of the latest configuration are summarized on the following table.

NIKA is a 2.3' FOV prototype used to test the technologies to be used in the bigger 6.5' FOV NIKA2 instrument currently in development phase.

NIKA2 main web page

NIKA2 development dedicated (private Wiki)

Call for proposals

NIKA is offered for the first time to the community the winter semester 2013/14:

• Call for observing proposals with the 30m

• Guidelines to estimate observing times (Billot et al. 2013).

Publications

• Improved mm-wave photometry for kinetic inductance detectors (Calvo et al. 2013, A&A)

• A Dual-band Millimeter-wave Kinetic Inductance Camera for the IRAM 30 m Telescope (Monfardini et al. 2011, ApJS)

• NIKA: A millimeter-wave kinetic inductance camera (Monfardini et al. 2010, A&A)

Support teams

• Overall coordinator:

  • Samuel Leclercq (IRAM/Grenoble, <leclercq@iram.fr>)

• NIKA team:

  • Alain Benoit <alain.benoit@grenoble.cnrs.fr> (PI, IN)

  • Alessandro Monfardini <monfardini@grenoble.cnrs.fr> (co-PI, IN)

  • François-Xavier Désert <francois-xavier.desert@obs.ujf-grenoble.fr> (IPAG)

  • Martino Calvo <martino.calvo@grenoble.cnrs.fr> (IN)

  • Antonio D'Addabbo <antonio.d-addabbo@grenoble.cnrs.fr> (IN)

  • Nicolas Ponthieu (IPAG)

  • Juan Macias-Perez <macias@lpsc.in2p3.fr> (LPSC)

  • Andrea Catalano <catalano@lpsc.in2p3.fr> (LPSC)

  • Remi Adam <adam@lpsc.in2p3.fr> (LPSC)

• IRAM/Granada support team:

  • Carsten Kramer (station manager, <kramer@iram.es>)

  • Israel Hermelo (bolometer pool manager, <hermelo@iram.es>)

  • Manuel Gonzalez (heterodyne pool manager, <gonzalez@iram.es>)

  • Nicolas Billot (30m scheduler, <billot@iram.es>)

  • Albrecht Sievers (<sievers@iram.es>)

  • Robert Zylka
  • Walter Brunswig

NIKA How-to's

• Pool Preparation (coming soon) provides information on the observing modes offered as well as examples of the scripts that you need to prepare to observe your project.

• Observing Session (coming soon) provides an example of a typical session at the 30m telescope with GISMO.

• Data Reduction (coming soon) provides some basic examples to reduce NIKA data.

• Frequently asked questions (coming soon) provides answers to some commonly asked questions.

1st NIKA pool (February 2014)

The 1st NIKA pool pool will take place from the 18th of February to the 28th of February 2014. Observations will be carried from a dedicated pool account (I. Hermelo will provide login information).

Pool projects and observers

For information about the accepted projects and the observers at the 30m please go to:

• List of accepted projects.

• Pool observers for the February 2014 run

• Room occupancy.

Progress

The progress of the 4th GISMO pool can be followed via:

• Pool data base

Previous observing runs

• 7th test run (January 2014)

  • Go to the 7th run Wiki page

• 6th test run (June 201)

  • Go to the 6th run Wiki page

• 5th test run (November 2012)

  • Go to the 5th run Wiki page

• 4th test run (June 2012)

  • Go to the 4th run Wiki page

• 3rd test run (October 2011)

  • Go to the 3rd run Wiki page

• 2nd test run (October 2010)

  • Go to the 2nd run Wiki page

• 1st test run (October 2009)

  • Go to the 1st run Wiki page

Author: Israel Hermelo (GISMO pool manager)

email: hermelo@iram.es

Created: 2013.12.16

This page is maintained by IH, CK, SL and the NIKA team

Last update: 2013.12.16