FY14/15 Interim Support for DESI - The Dark Energy Survey Instrument

This work will support the continuing development of the optical fibre system for the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) at Durham University's Centre for Advanced Instrumentation (CfAI), with a view towards CfAI being chosen to manufacture the full 5000 fibre system. The current plan is that construction will start in 2015. Once complete, DESI will study the expansion rate of the universe and the growth of cosmological structure through a 5-year survey of 14,000 square degrees of the extragalactic sky using the Mayall 4m telescope.

A PPRP bid to fund the full fibre system production is currently with Council and would, in due course, facilitate the Durham Univeristy institutional buy in.