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bHROS Performance and Use

Status and Availability:	bHROS began regular science use in the 2006A semester. The instrument has been indefinitely removed from availability, beginning with the 2007A semester. See the latest Call for Proposals for current information on future semesters.
Modes of Operations:	bHROS has two modes of operations: Single fiber object-only mode Dual fiber object/sky mode. See the bHROS Components page for details of each mode.
bHROS Components:	Specific elements of bHROS include the focal plane mask cassette, image slicers, collimator, echelle grating and cross-disperser, exposure meter, post-slit filter wheel, camera, and detector. See the bHROS components page for details.
Sensitivity:	The bHROS Sensitivity page contains details on exposure times and S/N ratios based on source properties, observing conditions and bHROS configurations. The limiting magnitude of bHROS is between 14 and 15.6 magnitude depending on grating and detector settings. Currently, the limiting factor is detector read noise and noise from the excess light within the instrument. See the bHROS Sensitivity page for more details. The estimated image quality delivered to the instrument is given as part of the observing condition constraints.
Observing Overheads:	See bHROS Overheads for information on estimating acquisition and observing overheads. Note that only overheads actually used will be charged to the programs.
Target Acquisition:	bHROS utilizes both the GMOS-S imager in conjunction with a fiducial mask and the bHROS exposure meter for target acquisition. See the bHROS Acquisition page for more detail.
Calibration:	Baseline calibrations of bHROS will be obtained for all observations, both classical and queue. *All calibrations, including baseline tellurics, flatfields and arcs, must be specified in the Phase II definition.*. These "baseline" calibrations are not charged to the program. Additional calibrations beyond the baseline set are charged to the program. See the bHROS Calibrations page for more information about the baseline calibration set and exposure times. Flat-fielding and wavelength calibration of bHROS are carried out using the facility calibration unit.
Data Processing and Software:	Software and scripts for processing bHROS data are not yet available as part of the Gemini IRAF package; we hope to have them available for semester 2007A. In the meantime, a processing 'recipe' is available in the bHROS Data Reduction page.

Last update March 20, 2007; Steven Margheim