The Kitt Peak National Observatory (KPNO) is a United States astronomical observatory located on Kitt Peak of the Quinlan Mountains in the Arizona-Sonoran Desert on the Tohono Oʼodham Nation, 88 kilometers (55 mi) west-southwest of Tucson, Arizona. With more than twenty optical and two radio telescopes, it is one of the largest gatherings of astronomical instruments in the Earth's northern hemisphere.
Astrophysics is a science that employs the methods and principles of physics and chemistry in the study of astronomical objects and phenomena. As one of the founders of the discipline, James Keeler, said, astrophysics "seeks to ascertain the nature of the heavenly bodies, rather than their positions or motions in space–what they are, rather than where they are." Among the subjects studied are the Sun, other stars, galaxies, extrasolar planets, the interstellar medium and the cosmic microwave background. Emissions from these objects are examined across all parts of the electromagnetic spectrum, and the properties examined include luminosity, density, temperature, and chemical composition. Because astrophysics is a very broad subject, astrophysicists apply concepts and methods from many disciplines of physics, including classical mechanics, electromagnetism, statistical mechanics, thermodynamics, quantum mechanics, relativity, nuclear and particle physics, and atomic and molecular physics.
Steven Alan Hawley is a former NASA astronaut who flew on five U.S. Space Shuttle flights. He is professor of physics and astronomy and director of engineering physics at the University of Kansas.
The Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics is part of the Max Planck Society, located in Garching, near Munich, Germany. In 1991 the Max Planck Institute for Physics and Astrophysics split up into the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics, the Max Planck Institute for Physics and the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics. The Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics was founded as sub-institute in 1963. The scientific activities of the institute are mostly devoted to astrophysics with telescopes orbiting in space. A large amount of the resources are spent for studying black holes in the Milky Way Galaxy and in the remote universe.
The National Centre for Radio Astrophysics is a research institution in India in the field of radio astronomy is located in the Pune University Campus, is part of the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Mumbai, India. NCRA has an active research program in many areas of Astronomy and Astrophysics, which includes studies of the Sun, Interplanetary scintillations, pulsars, the Interstellar medium, Active galaxies and cosmology and particularly in the specialized field of Radio Astronomy and Radio instrumentation. NCRA also provides exciting opportunities and challenges in engineering fields such as analog and digital electronics, signal processing, antenna design, telecommunication and software development.
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.
Leuschner Observatory, originally called the Students' Observatory, is an observatory jointly operated by the University of California, Berkeley and San Francisco State University. The observatory was built in 1886 on the Berkeley campus. For many years, it was directed by Armin Otto Leuschner, for whom the observatory was renamed in 1951. In 1965, it was relocated to its present home in Lafayette, California, approximately 10 miles (16 km) east of the Berkeley campus. In 2012, the physics and astronomy department of San Francisco State University became a partner.
Solar physics is the branch of astrophysics that specializes in the study of the Sun. It intersects with many disciplines of pure physics and astrophysics.
Arthur Bertram Cuthbert Walker Jr. was an African-American solar physicist and a pioneer of EUV/XUV optics. He developed normal incidence multilayer XUV telescopes to photograph the solar corona. Two of his sounding rocket payloads, the Stanford/MSFC Rocket Spectroheliograph Experiment and the Multi-Spectral Solar Telescope Array, recorded the first full-disk, high-resolution images of the Sun in XUV with conventional geometries of normal incidence optics. This technology is used in solar telescopes such as SOHO/EIT and TRACE, and in the fabrication of microchips via ultraviolet photolithography.
The Physical Research Laboratory is a National Research Institute for space and allied sciences, supported mainly by Department of Space, Government of India. This research laboratory has ongoing research programmes in astronomy and astrophysics, atmospheric sciences and aeronomy, planetary and geosciences, Earth sciences, Solar System studies and theoretical physics. It also manages the Udaipur Solar Observatory and Mount Abu InfraRed Observatory. The PRL is located in Ahmedabad.
The Astronomical Observatory of Rome is one of twelve Astronomical Observatories in Italy. The main site of the Observatory is Monte Porzio Catone. Part of the Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica since 2002.
The Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope (DKIST) is a scientific facility for studies of the Sun at Haleakala Observatory on the Hawaiian island of Maui. Known as the Advanced Technology Solar Telescope (ATST) until 2013, it was named after Daniel K. Inouye, a US Senator for Hawaii. It is the world's largest solar telescope, with a 4-meter aperture. The DKIST is funded by National Science Foundation and managed by the National Solar Observatory. The total project cost is $344.13 million. It is a collaboration of numerous research institutions. Some test images were released in January 2020. The end of construction and transition into scientific observations was announced in November 2021.
Tuorla Observatory is the Department of Astronomy at the University of Turku, southwest Finland. It is the largest astronomical research institute in Finland. Together with the Space Research Laboratory at the Physics Department of the University of Turku, it forms the Väisälä Institute of Space Physics and Astronomy (VISPA).
Michael David Reynolds was an American author and educator who served as professor of astronomy at Florida State College at Jacksonville in Jacksonville, Florida. He served as the director of Chabot Space and Science Center in Alameda County, California. Reynolds was best known for his work in science education, both in lecture halls and less formal settings. He also participated in astronomy and space exploration outreach.
The Carnegie Institution for Science, also known as Carnegie Science and the Carnegie Institution of Washington, is an organization in the United States established to fund and perform scientific research. The institution is headquartered in Washington, D.C. As of June 30, 2020, the Institution's endowment was valued at $926.9 million. In 2018 the expenses for scientific programs and administration were $96.6 million. Eric Isaacs is president of the institution.
The Givatayim Observatory is a public observatory that was founded in 1968 by the Israeli Astronomical Association and the Givatayim municipality.
The Heights Observatory is an Astronomical Observatory at The Heights School in Modbury Heights, Adelaide, South Australia.
Ramón E. López is a Puerto Rican physics professor at the University of Texas at Arlington whose research focuses on space physics and science education. He is an elected fellow of the American Physical Society (1999) and the recipient of its 2002 Dwight Nicholson Medal for Outreach for his contributions to science education. He is also an elected fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (2011).
The Norman and Helen Asher Space Research Institute (ASRI) is a specialized institute dedicated to multidisciplinary scientific research at Technion - Israel Institute of Technology, in Haifa, Israel.
Bayfordbury Observatory is the University of Hertfordshire's astronomical and atmospheric physics remote sensing observatory, and one of the largest teaching observatories in the UK. It is located in the relatively dark countryside of Bayfordbury, Hertfordshire, 6 miles from the main university campus in Hatfield. The first telescope was built in 1969, and since then has been used as a teaching observatory for undergraduate students, staff and student research as well as for public outreach activities.
