Two versions of the Manchester Echelle Spectrograph (MES) have now been constructed: one has been working successfully since 1983 on the Anglo-Australian Telescope. The second has been used on both INT and WHT, and may be available as a guest instrument in collaboration with the Manchester University Astronomy department.
The primary use of these dedicated echelle spectrographs is for problems which require emission or absorption line profiles, at high signal to noise ratios and reasonably high spectral resolutions. Their use up to now has been on the nuclei of Seyfert galaxies, starburst galaxies, giant extra-galactic and galactic HII regions, giant and supergiant interstellar shells, galactic supernova remnants, HH objects and Wolf-Rayet, planetary and bi-polar nebulae.
Note that the MES is not a common-user instrument,
though anyone is welcome to apply for time in collaboration with the Manchester
group. This point is discused in more detail in Section 