Kitt Peak National Observatory
The Kitt Peak National Observatory ( Kitt Peak National Observatory ) is a major astronomical observatory on the summit of 2,095-meter Kitt Peak in the Sonoran Desert , 65.4 km (straight line) southwest of Tucson , Arizona .
Kitt Peak was selected in 1958 as the location for the US National Observatory, which still operates today.
Today the observatory houses around 20 optical telescopes , of which the Mayall Telescope and the WIYN Telescope with main mirrors of 4 m and 3.5 m in diameter are the largest. The Spacewatch project operates two mirror telescopes 1.8 m and 0.9 m in diameter for observing asteroids and comets , in particular for finding objects near the earth . The McMath-Pierce Solar Telescope , the largest solar telescope in the world, and the Kitt Peak Vacuum Telescope are available for observing the sun at Kitt Peak . Finally, the Kitt Peak also houses two radio telescopes 12 m and 25 m in diameter. The latter is used in conjunction with other radio telescopes in the Very Long Baseline Array as a radio astronomical interferometer .
(2322) Kitt Peak , an asteroid of the main outer belt, was named after the observatory.
Illustrations
Burrell Schmidt telescope, 24 inch aperture , in operation since 1941
Radio telescope, 25 m aperture, part of the Very Long Baseline Array
See also
- Paranal observatory
- La Silla Observatory
- Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory
- European Extremely Large Telescope
Web links
- Homepage of the Kitt Peak National Observatory (English)
- WIYN corrector (English; PDF file; 387 kB)
- The bright planets at the McMath-Pierce Solar Telescope APOD March 16, 2012
Individual evidence
- ↑ http://ast.noao.edu/observing/current-telescopes-instruments#kpno
- ^ Lutz D. Schmadel : Dictionary of Minor Planet Names . Fifth Revised and Enlarged Edition. Ed .: Lutz D. Schmadel. 5th edition. Springer Verlag , Berlin , Heidelberg 2003, ISBN 978-3-540-29925-7 , pp. 186 (English, 992 pp., Link.springer.com [ONLINE; accessed August 1, 2019] Original title: Dictionary of Minor Planet Names . First edition: Springer Verlag, Berlin, Heidelberg 1992): “1954 UQ 2 . Discovered 1954 Oct. 28 at the Goethe Link Observatory at Brooklyn, Indiana. "
- ^ JJ Nassau : The Burrell Telescope of the Warner and Swasey Observatory . In: Astrophysical Journal . bibcode : 1945ApJ ... 101..275N .
Coordinates: 31 ° 57 ′ 48 ″ N , 111 ° 36 ′ 0 ″ W.