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The heavyweight stellar initial mass function (IMF) observed in the cores ofmassive early-type galaxies (ETGs) has been linked to formation of their coresin an initial swiftly-quenched rapid starburst. However, the outskirts of ETGsare thought to be assembled via the slow accumulation of smaller systems inwhich the star formation is less extreme; this suggests the form of the IMFshould exhibit a radial trend in ETGs. Here we report radial stellar populationgradients out to the half-light radii of a sample of eight nearby ETGs.Spatially resolved spectroscopy at 0.8-1.35{\mu}m from the VLT's KMOSinstrument was used to measure radial trends in the strengths of a variety ofIMF-sensitive absorption features (including some which are previouslyunexplored). We find weak or no radial variation in some of these which, givena radial IMF trend, ought to vary measurably, e.g. for the Wing-Ford band wemeasure a gradient of +0.06$\pm$0.04 per decade in radius.  Using stellar population models to fit stacked and individual spectra, weinfer that the measured radial changes in absorption feature strengths areprimarily accounted for by abundance gradients which are fairly consistentacross our sample (e.g. we derive an average [Na/H] gradient of-0.53$\pm$0.07). The inferred contribution of dwarf stars to the total lighttypically corresponds to a bottom heavy IMF, but we find no evidence for radialIMF variations in the majority of our sample galaxies.

KINETyS: Constraining spatial variations of the stellar initial mass function in early-type galaxies