 | |
| Location(s) | Coquimbo Region, Chile |
|---|---|
| Coordinates | 29°15′16″S70°44′22″W / 29.25453°S 70.73942°W /-29.25453; -70.73942 |
| Altitude | 2,400 m (7,900 ft) |
| Telescope style | Robotic optical telescope |
| Website | www |
  Location of TRAPPIST | |
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TheTransiting Planets and Planetesimals Small Telescope (TRAPPIST) is the corporate name for a pair of Belgian opticrobotic telescopes.TRAPPIST–South, which is situated high in the Chilean mountains at theEuropean Southern Observatory'sLa Silla Observatory, came online in 2010, andTRAPPIST–North situated at theOukaïmeden Observatory in theAtlas Mountains in Morocco, came online in 2016.[1]
TRAPPIST is controlled fromLiège, Belgium, with some autonomous features. It consists of two 60 cm (24 in) reflecting robotic telescopes located at the ESO La Silla Observatory (housed in the dome of the retiredSwiss T70 telescope) in Chile and at Oukaïmeden Observatory in Morocco.
The 60 cm f/8Ritchey–Chrétien design telescopes and New TechnologyMount NTM-500 were built byASTELCO Systems, a company in Germany. The CCD camera was built byFinger Lakes Instrumentation (USA), providing a 22 x 22 arcminutes field of view. The camera is fitted with a double filter wheel, allowing 12 different filters and one clear position.[2][3]
The telescope condominium is a joint venture between theUniversity of Liège, Belgium, and theGeneva Observatory, Switzerland, and among other tasks, it specializes in searching forcomets andexoplanets.[4][5]
In November 2010, it was one of the few telescopes that observed astellar occultation of the planetary bodyEris, revealing that it may be smaller thanPluto, and it helped observe a stellar occultation byMakemake, when it passed in front of the starNOMAD 1181-0235723. The observations of this event showed it lacked a significant atmosphere.[5][6]
A team of astronomers headed byMichaël Gillon, of theInstitut d'Astrophysique et Géophysique at theUniversity of Liège inBelgium, used the telescope to observe the ultracool dwarf star 2MASS J23062928-0502285, now also known asTRAPPIST-1. By utilisingtransit photometry, they discovered seven terrestrial planets, at least three of which were Earth-sized, orbiting the star; the innermost two were found to be tidally locked to their host star while the outermost appears to lie either within the system'shabitable zone or just outside of it.[7][8] The team published its findings in the May 2016 issue of theNature journal.[9]
While TRAPPIST-1 is the only planetary system discovered by TRAPPIST, other planetary systems have been discovered bySPECULOOS and given SPECULOOS-n designations, with TRAPPIST-1 being SPECULOOS-1.[10]
As with the other space observation projects of theUniversity of Liège likeSPECULOOS,Transiting Planets and Planetesimals Small Telescope is abackronym, referring to traditional BelgianTrappist beer.[11]
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