The Hubble Space Telescopes'
The Cosmic Origins Spectrograph (COS) is a new instrument for the
Hubble Space Telescope that is to be installed in 2008 during the now
revived SM-4.
It is designed for high throughput, medium resolution (R=20,000) spectroscopy of point
sources, allowing the efficient observation of numerous faint extragalactic
and galactic ultraviolet (1150-3000 A) targets.
The primary science objectives of the mission are the study of the origins
of large scale structure in the universe, the formation and evolution of galaxies,
and the origin of stellar and planetary systems and the cold interstellar mediume.
The instrument has been designed with maximum effective area as the primary constraint,
and would provide more than an order of magnitude gain in sensitivity over previous
HST instruments in this wavelength region.
COS will complement and extend the suite of HST instruments, ensuring that HST maintains a
powerful UV spectroscopic capability until the end of its mission, currently 2013.
