Lowell Observatory is an astronomical observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona, United States. Lowell Observatory was established in 1894, placing it among the oldest observatories in the United States, and was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1965. In 2011, the Observatory was named one of "The World's 100 Most Important Places" by Time Magazine. It was at the Lowell Observatory that the dwarf planet Pluto was discovered in 1930 by Clyde Tombaugh.
The Very Large Telescope (VLT) is a facility operated by the European Southern Observatory, located on Cerro Paranal in the Atacama Desert of northern Chile. It consists of four individual telescopes, each equipped with a primary mirror that measures 8.2 meters in diameter. These optical telescopes, named Antu, Kueyen, Melipal, and Yepun, are generally used separately but can be combined to achieve a very high angular resolution. The VLT array is also complemented by four movable Auxiliary Telescopes (ATs) with 1.8-meter apertures.
A Ritchey–Chrétien telescope is a specialized variant of the Cassegrain telescope that has a hyperbolic primary mirror and a hyperbolic secondary mirror designed to eliminate off-axis optical errors (coma). The RCT has a wider field of view free of optical errors compared to a more traditional reflecting telescope configuration. Since the mid 20th century, a majority of large professional research telescopes have been Ritchey–Chrétien configurations; some well-known examples are the Hubble Space Telescope, the Keck telescopes and the ESO Very Large Telescope.
A reflecting telescope is a telescope that uses a single or a combination of curved mirrors that reflect light and form an image. The reflecting telescope was invented in the 17th century by Isaac Newton as an alternative to the refracting telescope which, at that time, was a design that suffered from severe chromatic aberration. Although reflecting telescopes produce other types of optical aberrations, it is a design that allows for very large diameter objectives. Almost all of the major telescopes used in astronomy research are reflectors. Many variant forms are in use and some employ extra optical elements to improve image quality or place the image in a mechanically advantageous position. Since reflecting telescopes use mirrors, the design is sometimes referred to as a catoptric telescope.
The Apache Point Observatory is an astronomical observatory located in the Sacramento Mountains in Sunspot, New Mexico, United States, approximately 18 miles (29 km) south of Cloudcroft. The observatory is operated by New Mexico State University (NMSU) and owned by the Astrophysical Research Consortium (ARC). Access to the telescopes and buildings is private and restricted.
The Dominion Astrophysical Observatory, located on Observatory Hill, in Saanich, British Columbia, was completed in 1918 by the Canadian government. The Dominion architect responsible for the building was Edgar Lewis Horwood. The main instrument is the 72-inch-aperture (1.83 m) Plaskett telescope, proposed and designed by John S. Plaskett in 1910 with the support of the International Union for Cooperation in Solar Research.
The Galileo National Telescope, is a 3.58-meter Italian telescope, located at the Roque de los Muchachos Observatory on the island of La Palma in the Canary Islands, Spain. The TNG is operated by the "Fundación Galileo Galilei, Fundación Canaria", a non-profit institution, on behalf of the Italian National Institute of Astrophysics (INAF). The telescope saw first light in 1998 and is named after the Italian Renaissance astronomer Galileo Galilei.
The Southern Astrophysical Research (SOAR) telescope is a modern 4.1-meter (13 ft) aperture optical and near-infrared telescope located on Cerro Pachón, Chile at 2,738 metres (8,983 ft) elevation. It was commissioned in 2003, and is operated by a consortium including the countries of Brazil and Chile, Michigan State University, the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory (CTIO), and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Partners have guaranteed shares varying from 10 to 30 percent of the observing time.
The Florence and George Wise Observatory is an astronomical observatory owned and operated by Tel Aviv University. It is located 5 kilometers west of the town of Mitzpe Ramon in the Negev desert near the edge of the Ramon Crater, and it is the only professional astronomical observatory in Israel.
The Hirsch Observatory is an astronomical observatory at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) in Troy, New York. It is located on the roof of the Jonsson-Rowland Science Center and is used by members of the Rensselaer Astrophysical Society as well as astronomy students in laboratory exercises. It is frequently opened to the community for public viewing sessions. The observatory's main dome contains a 16" Cassegrain Reflector, with a CCD camera and fully computerized controls. The observatory also owns a variety of smaller scopes and a SBIG Spectrograph. The spectrograph has been used to catalog bright solar spectrum as part of an effort to create an online digital database for astrophysical research. The current director of the observatory is Professor Heidi Newberg.
TÜBİTAK National Observatory is a ground-based astronomical observatory operated by the TUG Institute of the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TUBITAK). Established in 1991, it is located at an altitude of 2,450 m (8,040 ft) in Bakırtepe, around 50 km (31 mi) west-southwest of Antalya in southern Turkey.
The Orion space telescopes were a series of two instruments flown aboard Soviet spacecraft during the 1970s to conduct ultraviolet spectroscopy of stars.
The Shamakhy Astrophysical Observatory, named after Nasreddin Tusi of the National Academy of Sciences of Azerbaijan was established on November 17, 1959, by decree No. 975 of the Council of Ministers of the Azerbaijan SSR. ShAO operates as a research institute within the ANAS Department of Physical, Mathematical, and Technical Sciences. The Observatory is located in the north-east of the Greater Caucasus Range, 150 km from the city of Baku, in the eastern part of Mount Pirkuli, at an altitude of 1435–1500 m above sea level, in geographical coordinates λ = 48⁰ 35' 04" E, φ = 40⁰ 46 '20"N. Here the number of clear nights suitable for observation reaches 150-180 per year.
The Observatory Vsetín was found in 1950 by the local branch of Czechoslovak Astronomical Society.
The Nicholas U. Mayall Telescope, also known as the Mayall 4-meter Telescope, is a four-meter reflector telescope located at the Kitt Peak National Observatory in Arizona and named after Nicholas U. Mayall. It saw first light on February 27, 1973, and was the second-largest telescope in the world at that time. Initial observers included David Crawford, Nicholas Mayall, and Arthur Hoag. It was dedicated on June 20, 1973 after Mayall's retirement as director. The mirror has an f/2.7 hyperboloidal shape. It is made from a two-foot thick fused quartz disk that is supported in an advanced-design mirror cell. The prime focus has a field of view six times larger than that of the Hale reflector. It is host to the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument. The identical Víctor M. Blanco Telescope was later built at Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory, in Chile.
The Great Melbourne Telescope was built by the Grubb Telescope Company in Dublin, Ireland in 1868, and installed at the Melbourne Observatory in Melbourne, Australia in 1869. In 1945 that Observatory closed and the telescope was sold and moved to the Mount Stromlo Observatory near Canberra. It was rebuilt in the late 1950s. In 2003 the telescope, still in use as an observatory, was severely damaged in a bushfire. About 70% of the components were salvageable; a project to restore the telescope to working condition started in 2013.
Fesenkov Astrophysical Institute, or FAI, is a research institute in Almaty, Kazakhstan. The institute was founded in 1941 as the Institute for Astronomy and Physics of the Kazakh branch of the USSR Academy of Sciences, when a group of Soviet astronomers was evacuated during World War II from the European parts of the USSR to Almaty. In 1948 G.A. Tikhov had organized an independent sector of astrobotany, and in 1950 astronomers established the Astrophysical Institute of the Kazakh SSR. In 1989 the institute was renamed after Vasily Fesenkov, one of its founders.
The Tien Shan Astronomical Observatory is an astronomical observatory located in the Tien Shan Mountains at 2,800 meters altitude, 30 kilometers south of the city of Almaty in Kazakhstan. It was assigned to the Sternberg Astronomical Institute (GAISh) until the collapse of the Soviet Union. The observatory is a state-owned scientific institution that belongs to the Astrophysical Institute after V.G. Fesenkov. It is often used for photometric investigations of variable stars in the Milky Way, eclipsing systems.
Yerkes 41-inch reflector is a 40-inch aperture (101.6 cm) reflecting telescope at the Yerkes Observatory, that was completed in 1968. It is known as the 41 inch to avoid confusion with a 40 inch refractor at the observatory. Optically it is a Ritchey–Chrétien design, and the main mirror uses low expansion glass. The telescope was used as a testbed for an adaptive optics system in the 1990s.
Observatory "Kamenskoe Plateau" is an astronomical observatory founded in 1947 at the Fesenkov Astrophysical Institute. In 1948, Gavriil Tikhov headed an independent institution - the astrobotany sector of the Academy of Sciences of the Kazakh SSR - and founded his own observatory. After Tikhov's death in 1960, the astrobotany sector was disbanded. The observatory is located in the grounds of the Fesenkov Institute.
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