High-Fidelity Spectroscopy at the Highest Resolutions
  High-fidelity spectroscopy presents challenges for both observations and in
designing instruments. High-resolution and high-accuracy spectra are required
for verifying hydrodynamic stellar atmospheres and for resolving intergalactic
absorption-line structures in quasars. Even with great photon fluxes from large
telescopes with matching spectrometers, precise measurements of line profiles
and wavelength positions encounter various physical, observational, and
instrumental limits. The analysis may be limited by astrophysical and telluric
blends, lack of suitable lines, imprecise laboratory wavelengths, or
instrumental imperfections. To some extent, such limits can be pushed by
forming averages over many similar spectral lines, thus averaging away small
random blends and wavelength errors. In situations where theoretical
predictions of lineshapes and shifts can be accurately made (e.g., hydrodynamic
models of solar-type stars), the consistency between noisy observations and
theoretical predictions may be verified; however this is not feasible for,
e.g., the complex of intergalactic metal lines in spectra of distant quasars,
where the primary data must come from observations. To more fully resolve
lineshapes and interpret wavelength shifts in stars and quasars alike, spectral
resolutions on order R=300,000 or more are required; a level that is becoming
(but is not yet) available. A grand challenge remains to design efficient
spectrometers with resolutions approaching R=1,000,000 for the forthcoming
generation of extremely large telescopes.
