Cerro Paranal

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Cerro Paranal
Paranal camp.jpg
Paranal camp
Highest point
Elevation 2,635 m (8,645 ft)
Coordinates 24°37′38″S70°24′17″W / 24.62722°S 70.40472°W / -24.62722; -70.40472
Geography
Cerro Paranal
Location Atacama Desert, northern Chile
Parent range Chilean Coast Range

Cerro Paranal is a mountain in the Atacama Desert of northern Chile and is the home of the Paranal Observatory. Prior to the construction of the observatory, the summit was a horizontal control point with an elevation of 2,664 m (8,740 ft); [1] now it is 2,635 m (8,645 ft) above sea level. It is the site of the Very Large Telescope and the VLT Survey Telescope. It is located 120 km (75 mi) south of Antofagasta and 80 km (50 mi) north of Taltal, as well as 15 km (9.3 mi) inland and 5 km (3.1 mi) west of highway B-710.

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Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Very Large Telescope</span> Telescope in the Atacama Desert, Chile

The Very Large Telescope (VLT) is an astronomical facility operated since 1998 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.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">European Southern Observatory</span> Intergovernmental organization and observatory in Chile

The European Organisation for Astronomical Research in the Southern Hemisphere, commonly referred to as the European Southern Observatory (ESO), is an intergovernmental research organisation made up of 16 member states for ground-based astronomy. Created in 1962, ESO has provided astronomers with state-of-the-art research facilities and access to the southern sky. The organisation employs over 750 staff members and receives annual member state contributions of approximately €162 million. Its observatories are located in northern Chile.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">VLT Survey Telescope</span> Telescope in the Atacama Desert, Chile

The VLT Survey Telescope (VST) is a telescope located at ESO's Paranal Observatory in the Atacama Desert of northern Chile. It is housed in an enclosure immediately adjacent to the four Very Large Telescope (VLT) Unit Telescopes on the summit of Cerro Paranal. The VST is a wide-field survey telescope with a field of view twice as broad as the full Moon. It is the largest telescope in the world designed to exclusively survey the sky in visible light.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">VISTA (telescope)</span> Telescope at the Paranal Observatory in Chile

The VISTA is a wide-field reflecting telescope with a 4.1 metre mirror, located at the Paranal Observatory in Chile. It is operated by the European Southern Observatory and started science operations in December 2009. VISTA was conceived and developed by a consortium of universities in the United Kingdom led by Queen Mary University of London and became an in-kind contribution to ESO as part of the UK's accession agreement, with the subscription paid by the UK Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">New Technology Telescope</span> Astronomical telescope in Chile

The New Technology Telescope or NTT is a 3.58-metre Ritchey–Chrétien telescope operated by the European Southern Observatory. It began operations in 1989. It is located in Chile at the La Silla Observatory and was an early pioneer in the use of active optics. The telescope and its enclosure were built to a revolutionary design for optimal image quality.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Laser guide star</span> Artificial star image used by telescopes

A laser guide star is an artificial star image created for use in astronomical adaptive optics systems, which are employed in large telescopes in order to correct atmospheric distortion of light. Adaptive optics (AO) systems require a wavefront reference source of light called a guide star. Natural stars can serve as point sources for this purpose, but sufficiently bright stars are not available in all parts of the sky, which greatly limits the usefulness of natural guide star adaptive optics. Instead, one can create an artificial guide star by shining a laser into the atmosphere. Light from the beam is reflected by components in the upper atmosphere back into the telescope. This star can be positioned anywhere the telescope desires to point, opening up much greater amounts of the sky to adaptive optics.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">La Silla Observatory</span> Astronomical observatory in Chile

La Silla Observatory is an astronomical observatory in Chile with three telescopes built and operated by the European Southern Observatory (ESO). Several other telescopes are also located at the site and are partly maintained by ESO. The observatory is one of the largest in the Southern Hemisphere and was the first in Chile to be used by ESO.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Paranal Observatory</span> Astronomical observatory in Chile

Paranal Observatory is an astronomical observatory operated by the European Southern Observatory (ESO). It is located in the Atacama Desert of Northern Chile on Cerro Paranal at 2,635 m (8,645 ft) altitude, 120 km (70 mi) south of Antofagasta. By total light-collecting area, it is the largest optical-infrared observatory in the Southern Hemisphere; worldwide, it is second to the Mauna Kea Observatory on Hawaii.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Extremely Large Telescope</span> Major astronomical facility in Chile

The Extremely Large Telescope (ELT) is an astronomical observatory under construction. When completed, it will be the world's largest optical and near-infrared extremely large telescope. Part of the European Southern Observatory (ESO) agency, it is located on top of Cerro Armazones in the Atacama Desert of northern Chile.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Teide Observatory</span> Astronomical observatory in the Canary Islands, Spain

Teide Observatory, IAU code 954, is an astronomical observatory on Mount Teide at 2,390 metres (7,840 ft), located on Tenerife, Spain. It has been operated by the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias since its inauguration in 1964. It became one of the first major international observatories, attracting telescopes from different countries around the world because of the good astronomical seeing conditions. Later, the emphasis for optical telescopes shifted more towards Roque de los Muchachos Observatory on La Palma.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Atacama Pathfinder Experiment</span> Radio telescope in the Atacama Desert, northern Chile

The Atacama Pathfinder Experiment (APEX) is a radio telescope 5,064 meters above sea level, at the Llano de Chajnantor Observatory in the Atacama Desert in northern Chile, 50 km east of San Pedro de Atacama built and operated by three European research institutes. The main dish has a diameter of 12 m and consists of 264 aluminium panels with an average surface accuracy of 17 micrometres (rms). The telescope was officially inaugurated on September 25, 2005.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Llano de Chajnantor Observatory</span> Observatory

Llano de Chajnantor Observatory is the name for a group of astronomical observatories located at an altitude of over 4,800 m (15,700 ft) in the Atacama Desert of northern Chile. The site is in the Antofagasta Region approximately 50 kilometres (31 mi) east of the town of San Pedro de Atacama. The exceptionally arid climate of the area is inhospitable to humans, but creates an excellent location for millimeter, submillimeter, and mid-infrared astronomy. This is because water vapour absorbs and attenuates submillimetre radiation. Llano de Chajnantor is home to the largest and most expensive astronomical telescope project in the world, the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA). Llano de Chajnantor and the surrounding area has been designated as the Chajnantor Science Reserve by the government of Chile.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pipe Nebula</span> Dark nebula in the constellation Ophiuchus

The Pipe Nebula is a dark nebula in the Ophiuchus constellation and a part of the Dark Horse Nebula. It is a large but readily apparent smoking pipe-shaped dust lane that obscures the Milky Way star clouds behind it. Clearly visible to the naked eye in the Southern United States under clear dark skies, but it is best viewed with 7× binoculars.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">ESO Hotel</span> Hotel in Chile

ESO Hotel at Cerro Paranal is the accommodation for Paranal Observatory in Chile since 2002. It is mainly used for the ESO scientists and engineers who work there on a roster system. It has been called a "boarding house on Mars", because the desert surroundings are Mars-like, and an "Oasis for astronomers". It is not a commercial hotel, and the public cannot book rooms.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cerro Armazones</span> Mountain in Chile

Cerro Armazones is a mountain located in the Sierra Vicuña Mackenna of the Chilean Coast Range of the Andes, approximately 130 km (81 mi) southeast of Antofagasta in the Antofagasta Region, Chile. The mountain is situated in an ideal location for optical astronomy due to its 89% cloudless nights annually. On 26 April 2010, the European Southern Observatory Council selected Cerro Armazones as the site for the planned Extremely Large Telescope (ELT); construction commenced in June 2014. The first light observation is scheduled for 2027.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">PIONIER (Very Large Telescope)</span>

The Precision Integrated-optics Near-infrared Imaging Experiment (PIONIER) is a visiting instrument at the ESO's Paranal Observatory, part of the VLTI astronomical observatory. It combines the light from four telescopes simultaneously and provide 0.002 arc seconds of angular resolution, the equivalent angular resolution of a 100 m telescope.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">ESPRESSO</span> Echelle spectrograph on ESO VLT, Chile

ESPRESSO is a third-generation, fiber fed, cross-dispersed, echelle spectrograph mounted on the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope (VLT). The unit saw its first light with one VLT in December 2017 and first light with all four VLT units in February 2018.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cerro Murphy Observatory</span> Astronomical observatory in Chile

Cerro Murphy Observatory is an international astrophysical project hosted by the ESO Paranal Observatory and operated by the Nicolaus Copernicus Astronomical Center of the Polish Academy of Sciences. The observatory is located on Cerro Murphy, which is a hill located 1 kilometre to the southwest and 230 metres (750 ft) below the summit of Cerro Armazones, a mountain in the Antofagasta Region of Chile, 120 km (75 mi) south of Antofagasta. OCM is located at 2,817 m (9,242 ft) altitude and currently houses 5 telescopes, whose diameters range between 0.3 and 1.5 m.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Visible Multi Object Spectrograph</span> Wide field imager and multi-object spectrograph at the VLT in Chile

The Visible Multi-Object Spectrograph (VIMOS) is a wide field imager and a multi-object spectrograph installed at the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope (VLT), in Chile. The instrument used for deep astronomical surveys delivers visible images and spectra of up to 1,000 galaxies at a time. VIMOS images four rectangular areas of the sky, 7 by 8 arcminutes each, with gaps of 2 arcminutes between them. Its principal investigator was Olivier Le Fèvre.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">SPECULOOS</span> Astronomical observatory

SPECULOOS (Search for habitable Planets EClipsing ULtra-cOOl Stars) is a project consisting of SPECULOOS Southern Observatory (SSO) at the Paranal Observatory in Chile and SPECULOOS Northern Observatory (SNO) at the Teide Observatory in Tenerife.

References

  1. Joint Operations Graphic (JPEG) (Map) (1 ed.). 1 : 250,000. 1501. Defence Mapping Agency Topographic Center. 1974. p. Sheet SG 19-2.
  2. "Up high". www.eso.org. Retrieved 27 March 2017.
  3. "Zodiacal Light". www.eso.org. Retrieved 19 November 2009.

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