The Near-Infrared Spectrograph (NIRSpec) on the James Webb Space Telescope. I. Overview of the instrument and its capabilities

By P. Jakobsen, P. Ferruit, C. Oliveira, S. Arribas, G. Bagnasco, R. Barho, T. Beck, S. Birkmann, T. Böker, A. Bunker and 61 more. Astronomy & Astrophysics, 2022

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We provide an overview of the design and capabilities of the near-infrared spectrograph (NIRSpec) onboard the James Webb Space Telescope. NIRSpec is designed to be capable of carrying out low-resolution ($R\!=30\!-330$) prism spectroscopy over the wavelength range $0.6-5.3\!~\mu$m and higher resolution ($R\!=500\!-1340$ or $R\!=1320\!-3600$) grating spectroscopy over $0.7-5.2\!~\mu$m, both in single-object mode employing any one of five fixed slits, or a 3.1$\times$3.2 arcsec$^2$ integral field unit, or in multiobject mode employing a novel programmable micro-shutter device covering a 3.6$\times$3.4~arcmin$^2$ field of view. The all-reflective optical chain of NIRSpec and the performance of its different components are described, and some of the trade-offs made in designing the instrument are touched upon. The faint-end spectrophotometric sensitivity expected of NIRSpec, as well as its dependency on the energetic particle environment that its two detector arrays are likely to be subjected to in orbit are also discussed.

Subfields: Astronomy and Astrophysics, Instrumentation, Spectroscopy

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/ebff196063f33a8b08028d162f8e7bfc03df076c

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The GLASS-JWST Early Release Science Program. I. Survey Design and Release Plans (2022, methodology): “With the above in mind, the GLASS-JWST-ERS program (JWST-ERS-1324: PI: Treu) will obtain the deepest ERS observations with NIRISS (Doyon et al. 2012), NIRSpec (Jakobsen et al. 2022), and NIRCam (Rieke et al. 2005).”
CEERS Epoch 1 NIRCam Imaging: Reduction Methods and Simulations Enabling Early JWST Science Results (2022, background): “…et al. 2003, 2005; Beichman et al. 2012) short and long-wavelength channels in ten pointings, observed as coordinated parallels to primary observations with the Near Infrared Spectrograph (NIRSpec; Jakobsen et al. 2022) and the MidInfrared Instrument (MIRI; Rieke et al. 2015; Wright et al. 2015).”
A Comprehensive Study of Galaxies at z ∼ 9–16 Found in the Early JWST Data: Ultraviolet Luminosity Functions and Cosmic Star Formation History at the Pre-reionization Epoch (2022, methodology): “NIRISS spectroscopic data complements the NIRSpec observations and provide a spectroscopic sample of z∼ 1–8 galaxies (Boyett et al. 2022; RobertsBorsani et al. 2022; Wang et al. 2022; Marchesini et al. 2023).”
The James Webb Space Telescope Mission (2023, methodology): “NIRSpec (Jakobsen et al. 2022; Böker et al. 2023, this issue) provides spectroscopy from 0.6 to 5.3 μm at R∼ 100, R∼ 1000 and R∼ 3000 using fixed slits, a microshutter assembly (MSA) (Ferruit et al. 2022), or an IFU (Böker et al. 2022).”
A Long Time Ago in a Galaxy Far, Far Away: A Candidate z ∼ 12 Galaxy in Early JWST CEERS Imaging (2022, methodology): “Such confirmation should be possible in modest exposure times with the NIRSpec and/or MIRI spectrographs on board JWST.”
JWST Census for the Mass–Metallicity Star Formation Relations at z = 4–10 with Self-consistent Flux Calibration and Proper Metallicity Calibrators (2023, background): “One important advancement for the high-redshift community is provided by the high sensitivity of the Near Infrared Spectrograph ( NIRSpec; Jakobsen et al. 2022 ) at λ ; 2 – 5 μ m, allowing us to address directly the key questions relating to the physical conditions of the interstellar medium ( ISM…”
The Science Performance of JWST as Characterized in Commissioning (2022, background): “Jakobsen et al. 2022, A&A, 661, A80 Kammerer et al. 2022, arxiv:2210.17528 Lightsey et al., 2014, SPIE, 9143, 12 Mather, J., et al. 2022, PASP, this issue Menzel, M. et al. 2022, PASP, this issue Pontoppidan, K. et al. 2022, ApJ Letters, 936, 14 Rieke, M., et al. 2022, PASP, this issue Rigby, J. et…”
High Tide or Riptide on the Cosmic Shoreline? A Water-rich Atmosphere or Stellar Contamination for the Warm Super-Earth GJ 486b from JWST Observations (2023, methodology): “We observed two transits of GJ 486b using the Near InfraRed Spectrograph (NIRSpec; Birkmann et al. 2022; Jakobsen et al. 2022) G395H instrument mode, covering wavelengths 2.87–5.14 μm at an average native spectral resolution 2700~ .”