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The 0.6-m Super-LOTIS (Livermore Optical Transient Imaging System) telescope is a fully robotic system dedicated to the search for prompt optical emission from gamma-ray bursts. The telescope began routine operations from its Steward Observatory site atop Kitt Peak in April 2000. We summarize the current capabilities of the system and present some recent scientific results. A progress report is given on the upgrade of the system to allow for simultaneous near-infrared (NIR) and optical imaging. This upgrade will be completed to coincide with the launch of the Swift GRB explorer mission in mid-2004. Swift will have the capability of localizing very high redshift GRBs but absorption by the Ly-α forest prohibits optical detection of z > 5 bursts. NIR observations can detect GRBs out to z ∼ 10. Although Swift is a multi-wavelength observatory capable of observing GRBs from the hard x-rays to the optical it has no NIR capability. The upgraded Super-LOTIS telescope will fill this NIR need. © 2004 American Institute of Physics [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

LOTIS (Livermore Optical Transient Imaging System) and Super-LOTIS are automatic telescope systems that measure very prompt optical emission occurring within seconds of the gamma-ray energy release during a Gamma Ray Burst (GRB). Unlike hour-todays delayed afterglow measurements, very early measurements will contain information about the GRB progenitor. To accomplish this, we developed and have been operating automated telescopes that rapidly image GRB coordinate error boxes in response to triggers distributed by the GRB Coordinate Distribution Network (GCN). LOTIS, located in California, consists of 4 cameras each with a different astronomical filter (B, V, R, open) that can respond to GRB triggers within 5 s. Super-LOTIS can point to any part of the sky within 30 s upon receipt of a GCN trigger and its sensitivity is as deep as V=17~19 depending on the integration times. Since the shutdown of the CGRO, there has been no real-time GRB triggers that enable the LOTIS systems to measure real-time GRB counterpart fluxes as of May 2001. This paper describes performance of these systems. We also present our plan to replace the current optical CCD camera on the Super-LOTIS to a near infrared camera to be able to probe dusty GRB environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]