Hector is a multi-hexabundle IFU fibre system and spectrograph for the Anglo-Australian Telescope (AAT). It incorporates a novel new positioning system, new-format optical fibre imaging bundles called “hexabundles”, and a new higher-resolution spectrograph alongside the existing AAOmega spectrograph. It is being retrofitted to the existing 2dF top end and uses the the 2dF corrector but not the 2dF robot. This instrument concept builds on the success of the SAMI instrument which completed a large spatially resolved galaxy survey from 2013-2019.
The Hector concept was selected by the Australian astronomical community as one of two key new facilities for the AAT. The Hector Galaxy Survey will take spatially resolved spectroscopy of up to 15,000 galaxies – 5 times the statistical sample achieved by SAMI.
