An observatory is a location used for observing terrestrial, marine, or celestial events. Astronomy, climatology/meteorology, geophysics, oceanography and volcanology are examples of disciplines for which observatories have been constructed.
The term observatoire has been used in French since at least 1976 to denote any institution that compiles and presents data on a particular subject (such as public health observatory) or for a particular geographic area (European Audiovisual Observatory).
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 2,635Â m (8,645Â ft) altitude, 120Â km (70Â 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.
The Very Large Telescope (VLT), the largest telescope on Paranal, is composed of four separate 8.2Â m (320Â in) telescopes. In addition, the four main telescopes can be used simultaneously for extra light gathering capacity, and for interferometry. Four auxiliary telescopes of 1.8Â m (71Â in) each are also part of the VLTI to make it available when the main telescopes are being used for other projects. The site also houses two survey telescopes with wide fields of view, the 4.0Â m (160Â in) VISTA and the 2.6Â m (100Â in) VLT Survey Telescope for surveying large areas of the sky; and two arrays of small telescopes called NGTS and SPECULOOS which are dedicated to searching for exoplanets.
The W. M. Keck Observatory is an astronomical observatory with two telescopes at an elevation of 4,145 meters (13,600Â ft) near the summit of Mauna Kea in the U.S. state of Hawaii. Both telescopes have 10Â m (33Â ft) aperture primary mirrors, and, when completed in 1993 (Keck I) and 1996 (Keck II), they were the largest optical reflecting telescopes in the world. They have been the third and fourth largest since 2006.
Roque de los Muchachos Observatory (Spanish: Observatorio del Roque de los Muchachos, ORM) is an astronomical observatory located in the municipality of GarafĂa on the island of La Palma in the Canary Islands, Spain. The observatory site is operated by the Instituto de AstrofĂsica de Canarias, based on nearby Tenerife. ORM is part of the European Northern Observatory.
The seeing statistics at ORM make it the second-best location for optical and infrared astronomy in the Northern Hemisphere, after Mauna Kea Observatory, Hawaii. The site also has some of the most extensive astronomical facilities in the Northern Hemisphere; its fleet of telescopes includes the 10.4 m Gran Telescopio Canarias, the world's largest single-aperture optical telescope as of July 2009, the William Herschel Telescope (second largest in Europe), and the adaptive optics corrected Swedish 1-m Solar Telescope.
The Geneva Observatory (French: Observatoire de GenĂšve, German: Observatorium von Genf) is an astronomical observatory at Sauverny (CH) in the municipality of Versoix, Canton of Geneva, in Switzerland. It shares its buildings with the astronomy department of the Ăcole Polytechnique FĂ©dĂ©rale de Lausanne. It has been active in discovering exoplanets, in stellar photometry, modelling stellar evolution, and has been involved in the European Space Agency's Hipparcos, INTEGRAL, Gaia, and Planck missions.
In 1995, the first exoplanet found orbiting a main-sequence star, 51 Pegasi b, was discovered by two scientists of the observatory, Michel Mayor and Didier Queloz, using the radial velocity method with the 1.9-metre telescope at Haute-Provence Observatory in France. Mayor and Queloz were awarded (half of) the Nobel Prize in Physics 2019 for this discovery.
Teide Observatory (Spanish: Observatorio del Teide), IAU code 954, is an astronomical observatory on Mount Teide at 2,390 metres (7,840Â ft), located on Tenerife, Spain. It has been operated by the Instituto de AstrofĂsica 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.
The Giuseppe S. Vaiana Astronomical Observatory is an astronomical observatory located in Palermo, Sicily, Italy, housed inside the Palazzo dei Normanni. It is one of the research facilities of the National Institute of Astrophysics. The observatory carries out research projects in the field of astronomy and astrophysics including the study of solar and stellar coronas, stellar evolution (including the birth of stars) and of the supernova remnants.
Satellite laser ranging (SLR) is a method to measure the distance to satellites in a geocentric orbit. It consists of an astronomical observatory equipped with a laser that sends ultrashort pulses of light. The pulses hit the satellite and bounce back to be caught by the station, which measure the round trip time with the speed of light formula. These measurements are instantaneous and with millimeter level precision, which can be accumulated to provide accurate measurement of orbits and a host of important scientific data. Some satellites have retroreflectors, but the method also works on space debris.
Satellite laser ranging is a proven geodetic technique with significant potential for important contributions to scientific studies of the earth/atmosphere/ocean system. It is the most accurate technique currently available to determine the geocentric position of an Earth satellite, allowing for the precise calibration of radar altimeters and separation of long-term instrumentation drift from secular changes in ocean topography.
In astronomy, a transit instrument is a small telescope with an extremely precisely graduated mount used for the precise observation of star positions. They were previously widely used in astronomical observatories and naval observatories to measure star positions in order to compile nautical almanacs for use by mariners for celestial navigation, and observe star transits to set extremely accurate clocks (astronomical regulators) which were used to set marine chronometers carried on ships to determine longitude, and as primary time standards before atomic clocks. The instruments can be divided into three groups: meridian, zenith, and universal instruments.