1.1 Purpose

Document Conventions

The NICMOS Instrument Handbook is the basic reference manual for the Near Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrometer and describes the instrument’s properties, performance, and operations. A description of the image reduction and calibration can be found in the NICMOS Data Handbook. The Handbooks are maintained by the NICMOS Instrument Group at STScI.

We designed the document to serve three purposes:

•	To provide instrument-specific information for preparing observing proposals with NICMOS.

•	To provide instrument-specific information to support the design of Phase II programs for accepted NICMOS proposals (in conjunction with the Phase II Proposal Instructions).

•	To provide technical information about the current operation and performance of the instrument, which can help in understanding problems and interpreting data acquired with NICMOS.

This Handbook is not meant to serve as a manual for the reduction and analysis of data taken with NICMOS. For this, please refer to the HST Data Handbook

Document Conventions

This document follows the usual STScI convention in which terms, words, and phrases which are to be entered by the user in a literal way on a proposal are shown in a typewriter font (e.g., SAMP-sEQ=step16, multiaccum). Names of software packages or commands (e.g., synphot) are given in bold type.

Wavelength units in this Handbook are in microns (μm) and fluxes are given in Janskys (Jy), unless otherwise noted.