Higher dispersion and efficiency Bragg gratings for optical spectroscopy

Abstract: Massively multiplexed spectroscopic stellar surveys such as MSE present enormous challenges in the spectrograph design. The combination of high multiplex, large telescope aperture, high resolution (R~40,000) and natural seeing implies that multiple spectrographs with large beam sizes, large grating angles, and fast camera speeds are required, with high cost and risk. An attractive option to reduce the beam size is to use Bragg-type gratings at much higher angles than hitherto considered. As well as reducing the spectrograph size and cost, this also allows the possibility of very high efficiency due to a close match of s and p-polarization Bragg efficiency peaks. The grating itself could be a VPH grating, but Surface Relief (SR) gratings offer an increasingly attractive alternative, with higher maximum line density and better bandwidth. In either case, the grating needs to be immersed within large prisms to get the light to and from the grating at the required angles. We present grating designs and nominal spectrograph designs showing the efficiency gains and size reductions such gratings might allow for the MSE high resolution spectrograph.