Status of the BOOTES-IR Project at OSN for GRB near-IR follow-up

¹ Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía (IAA-CSIC), Glorieta de la Astronomía s/n, 18008 Granada, Spain
² Unidad Asociada Grupo Ciencia Planetarias UPV/EHU-IAA/CSIC, Departamento de Física Aplicada I, E.T.S. Ingeniería, Universidad del País Vasco UPV/EHU, Alameda de Urquijo s/n, 48013 Bilbao, Spain
³ Ikerbasque, Basque Foundation for Science, Alameda de Urquijo 36-5, 48008 Bilbao, Spain
⁴ Ogíjares, Granada, Spain

Abstract

Bootes-IR (Castro-Tiradoet al. 2005) is a robotic observatory based around a 60 cm alt-az telescope (dubbed T60) that can slew rapidly while carrying heavy instrumentation at the Nasmyth foci. Initially commissioned with an optical camera, with which the optical afterglow to GRB 060707 (http://gcn.gsfc.nasa.gov/gcn3/5290.gcn3) was discovered, we have concentrated our efforts on the near-IR (0.8–2.5 μm) camera (BIRCAM) for which the telescope was specifically designed. The telescope is installed at the Observatorio de Sierra Nevada near Granada in Spain, at an altitude of 3000 m and in an area of very low humidity. The telescope, dome, camera and liquid nitrogen generation and refilling systems have all been recently brought back into operation, and routine observations are expected to begin within the next few months.