SCUBA-2 is an innovative 10000 pixel bolometer camera operating at submillimetre wavelengths on the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope (JCMT). The camera has the capability to carry out wide-field surveys to unprecedented depths, addressing key questions relating to the origins of galaxies, stars and planets. With two imaging arrays working simultaneously in the atmospheric windows at 450 and 850 µm, the vast increase in pixel count means that SCUBA-2 maps the sky 100-150 times faster than the previous SCUBA instrument. In this paper we present an overview of the instrument, discuss the physical characteristics of the superconducting detector arrays, outline the observing modes and data acquisition, and present the early performance figures on the telescope. We also showcase the capabilities of the instrument via some early examples of the science SCUBA-2 has already undertaken. In February 2012, SCUBA-2 began a series of unique legacy surveys for the JCMT community. These surveys will take 2.5 years and the results are already providing complementary data to the shorter wavelength, shallower, larger-area surveys from Herschel. The SCUBA-2 surveys will also provide a wealth of information for further study with new facilities such as ALMA, and future telescopes such as CCAT and SPICA.

High-resolution Airborne Wide-band Camera (HAWC[Formula: see text]) is the facility far-infrared imager and polarimeter for SOFIA, NASA’s Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy. It is designed to cover the portion of the infrared spectrum that is completely inaccessible to ground-based observatories and which is essential for studies of astronomical sources with temperatures between tens and hundreds of degrees Kelvin. Its ability to make polarimetric measurements of aligned dust grains provides a unique new capability for studying interstellar magnetic fields. HAWC[Formula: see text] began commissioning flights in April 2016 and was accepted as a facility instrument in early 2018. In this paper, we describe the instrument, its operational procedures, and its performance on the observatory.

SCUBA-2 is an innovative 10,000 pixel submillimeter camera due to be delivered to the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope in late 2006. The camera is expected to revolutionize submillimeter astronomy in terms of the ability to carry out widefield surveys to unprecedented depths addressing key questions relating to the origins of galaxies, stars and planets. This paper presents an update on the project with particular emphasis on the laboratory commissioning of the instrument. The assembly and integration will be described as well as the measured thermal performance of the instrument. A summary of the performance results will be presented from the TES bolometer arrays, which come complete with in-focal plane SQUID amplifiers and multiplexed readouts, and are cooled to 100mK by a liquid cryogen-free dilution refrigerator. Considerable emphasis has also been placed on the operating modes of the instrument and the "common-user" aspect of the user interface and data reduction pipeline. These areas will also be described in the paper.

SuperSpec is an ultra-compact spectrometer-on-a-chip for millimeter and submillimeter wavelength astronomy. Its very small size, wide spectral bandwidth, and highly multiplexed readout will enable construction of powerful multibeam spectrometers for high-redshift observations. The spectrometer consists of a horn-coupled microstrip feedline, a bank of narrow-band superconducting resonator filters that provide spectral selectivity, and kinetic inductance detectors (KIDs) that detect the power admitted by each filter resonator. The design is realized using thin-film lithographic structures on a silicon wafer. The mm-wave microstrip feedline and spectral filters of the first prototype are designed to operate in the band from 195-310 GHz and are fabricated from niobium with at T c of 9.2 K. The KIDs are designed to operate at hundreds of MHz and are fabricated from titanium nitride with a T c of ∼ 2 K. Radiation incident on the horn travels along the mm-wave microstrip, passes through the frequency-selective filter, and is finally absorbed by the corresponding KID where it causes a measurable shift in the resonant frequency. In this proceedings, we present the design of the KIDs employed in SuperSpec and the results of initial laboratory testing of a prototype device. We will also briefly describe the ongoing development of a demonstration instrument that will consist of two 500-channel, R=700 spectrometers, one operating in the 1-mm atmospheric window and the other covering the 650 and 850 micron bands.