Preliminary Results from CINDERS: Circularized IFUs Now Deployed using Economical Robots on SOAR

Long slit spectroscopy provides stellar population and activity information along an entire axis of a target. Single fiber spectroscopy focuses in on specific regions of galaxies, such as the center. We discuss preliminary results from the addition of the CINDERS IFU module to the Goodman Spectrograph on the SOAR telescope, which provides the next stage, spatially resolved spectroscopy. CINDERS deploys three bundles of 61 fiber optic cables arranged in a nested circular pattern using inexpensive actuators that control 3-axis motion stages. The optics allow for 0.77" sampling of an 7" diameter region of up to three objects simultaneously in a 9'x4.5' field of view, making CINDERS ideal for clustered targets with more than 100" separation. Because approximately 78% of the bundle face is light sensitive, it is necessary to dither observations by 0.38" in a triangular pattern to adequately recover spatial resolution of the target. Using the 400 line/mm grating produces spectral coverage over 3700-7200AA at 5AA resolution. Initial system throughput measurements (excluding atmosphere), in the V-band, for one of the bundles are 65%. The initial project utilizing CINDERS involves mapping the central regions of 44 galaxies in Southern Compact Groups and determining the amount of star formation and AGN activity compared to isolated galaxies. We will discuss preliminary results for several of these groups.