MagNIFIES
MagNIFIES
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Magellans' Near-Infrared Five-band Immersion-grating Efficient Spectrograph
Designed to magnify our understanding of planet formation, exoplanets, and the assembly of the Milky Way
Overview
Overview
MagNIFIES is a single-object, seeing-limited, high-resolution, near-infrared spectrograph. We will commission and use it on Magellan starting in 2030, in preparation for its ultimate deployment on the Giant Magellan Telescope as GMTNIRS.
MagNIFIES will deliver:
Wavelength Coverage: 1.08 - 5.4 μm simultaneously
High Spectral Resolution: 45,000 (1.08 - 2.45 μm) and 60,000 (2.9 - 5.4 μm)
World-class sensitivity: cryogenic immersion gratings and no moving parts
MagNIFIES is a collaboration of University of Texas at Austin, Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute, Carnegie Science, and the Giant Magellan Telescope
PI: Greg Mace (UT)
KASI Instrument PI: Sungho Lee
Carnegie Program PI: Alycia Weinberger
We are grateful for funding from the Heising-Simons Foundation
Right: A subset of the team on a site visit to Las Campanas Observatory in May, 2026.
Our design philosophy is to keep the instrument simple and optimize for spectral grasp and sensitivity.
In a single exposure, MagNIFIES will observe the entire spectrum transmitted through the Earth's atmosphere from 1.08 - 5.4 μm while simultaneously providing very high wavelength sampling (resolution).
From the youngest stars still enshrouded in clouds of gas and dust to the bulge of stars that record the history of our Galaxy, Carnegie’s Magellan Telescopes have an unparalleled view of the Milky Way. MagNIFIES, will provide a unique platform with which to study exoplanet formation and evolution.
MagNIFIES_Science_Case_2025.pdf
SPIE papers that describe GMTNIRS/MagNIFIES are listed.
Note that IGRINS, an immersion grating spectrograph now at McDonald Observatory provides the heritage for MagNIFIES. More than 150 papers have cited it including 77 from Gemini-South. IGRINS2 is now a facility instrument at Gemini-North.
Software and Archiving
Software and Archiving
The MagNIFIES data reduction pipeline will be based on the IGRINS PLP (Kaplan 2024) and its data archive will be based on the "Raw & Reduced IGRINS Spectral Archive" (Sawczynec et al. 2025, PASP)
Community Participation
Community Participation
We welcome input on the MagNIFIES science case. Prior to commissioning, we anticipate a call for "Key Project" design that will engage a large community of users and use substantial telescope time for ambitious science. The Korean community can contact magnifies.kr@gmail.com. The GMT community can contact Greg Mace, and the Magellan Consortium community can contact Alycia Weinberger.
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