CAOSP abstracts, Volume: 43, No.: 3, year: 2014

Abstract: This review discusses the issues involved in building infrared cameras and spectrographs for small telescopes. Ground-based infrared observations face more difficult observing conditions than equivalent visible light work, due to the absorption in the earth's atmosphere and emission from both the atmosphere and telescope itself. As a result, infrared instrumentation is generally an order of magnitude more expensive than the corresponding visible light instruments. On the other hand, some scientific questions can only be answered by infrared observations. Specifically for small telescopes, the most important niche are infrared monitoring observations of variable object, both with photometry and spectroscopy.