.jpg) The Sutherland site of the South African Astronomical Observatory. With theSouthern African Large Telescope | |||||||||||||||||||||
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| Alternative names | SAAO  | ||||||||||||||||||||
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| Organization | National Research Foundation of South Africa | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Observatory code | 51, B31, A60, L66 | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Location | Headquarters inObservatory, Cape Town Major telescopes inSutherland, Northern Cape | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Coordinates | Headquarters:33°56′05″S18°28′39″E / 33.9347°S 18.4776°E /-33.9347; 18.4776 Sutherland:32°22′42″S20°48′38″E / 32.3783°S 20.8105°E /-32.3783; 20.8105 | ||||||||||||||||||||
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| Website | saao | ||||||||||||||||||||
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TheSouth African Astronomical Observatory (SAAO) is the national centre for optical and infrared astronomy in South Africa. It was established in 1972. The observatory is run by theNational Research Foundation of South Africa. The facility's function is to conduct research inastronomy andastrophysics. The primary telescopes are located inSutherland, which is 370 kilometres (230 mi) fromObservatory, Cape Town, where the headquarters is located.[2]
The SAAO has links worldwide for scientific and technological collaboration. Instrumental contributions from the South African Astronomical Observatory include the development of a spherical aberration corrector and theSouthern African Large Telescope (SALT).
TheNoon Gun on Cape Town'sSignal Hill is fired remotely by a time signal from the Observatory.
The history of the SAAO began when theRoyal Observatory at the Cape of Good Hope was founded in 1820, the first scientific institution in Africa.[3] Construction of the main buildings was completed in 1829 at a cost of£30,000[4] (equivalent to £3.3 million in 2023[5]).The post ofHis/Her Majesty's astronomer at the Cape of Good Hope was awarded theRoyal Medal on two occasions; the first toThomas Maclear in 1869 for measurement of anarc of the meridian at the Cape of Good Hope[6] and the second toDavid Gill in 1903 for researches in solar and stellar parallax, and his energetic direction of the Royal Observatory at the Cape of Good Hope.[7]
TheRepublic Observatory, Johannesburg, was merged with the much older Royal Observatory, Cape of Good Hope in January 1972 to form the South African Astronomical Observatory. In 1974 theRadcliffe Observatory telescope was purchased by the CSIR and moved to Sutherland, where it recommenced work in 1976.
SAAO was established in January 1972, as a result of a joint agreement by theCouncil for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) of South Africa andScience and Engineering Research Council (SERC) of United Kingdom. The headquarters are located on the grounds of the old Royal Observatory where the main building, offices,national library for astronomy and computer facilities are housed. Historic telescopes are also found at the headquarters in a number of domes and a small museum that displays scientific instruments. The South African Astronomical Observatory is administered at present as a National Facility under management of the National Research Foundation (NRF), formerly the Foundation for Research Development (FRD). In 1974, when the Radcliffe Observatory in Pretoria closed, the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) purchased the 1.9-mRadcliffe Telescope and transported it to Sutherland.[8]
The observatory operates from the campus of theRoyal Observatory, Cape of Good Hope that was established in 1820[9] in the suburb ofObservatory, Cape Town.
The major observing facilities are, however, located near the town of Sutherland some 370 kilometres (230 mi)[2] fromCape Town. Sutherland was chosen because of its reliably clear and dark nights, but to ensure long term viability of the Karoo site astronomy instruments, the South African Parliament passed the Astronomy Geographic Advantage Act in 2007. The act gives the Minister of Science and Technology the authority to protect areas, through regulations, that are of strategic national importance for astronomy and related scientific endeavours.
This 0.5-metre (20-inch) reflector was originally built for theRepublic Observatory in 1967, but was moved to the Sutherland site in 1972. It is no longer in use. The 20" telescope was replaced with the Meerlicht telescope. The 20" telescope was relocated to theUniversity of Freestate Boyden observatory and commissioned in ~2019.[10]
A 0.75-metre (30-inch)Grubb Parsons reflector.
This 40-inch (1.0-metre) telescope was originally located at SAAO Head office inObservatory, Cape Town, but has since moved to the Sutherland site.[11] This telescope participates in thePLANET network.[12]
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The 1.9-metre (74-inch) Radcliffe Telescope was commissioned for theRadcliffe Observatory inPretoria where it was in use between 1948 and 1974. Following the closure of the Radcliffe Observatory it was moved toSutherland where it became operational again in January 1976. Between 1951 and 2004 it was the largest telescope in South Africa.[13] The telescope was manufactured bySir Howard Grubb, Parsons and Co.[14]
This 29.5-inch (75 cm) telescope was originally called the Automatic Photometric Telescope, but has been renamed the Alan Cousins Telescope in honour ofAlan William James Cousins.[15][16]
One of six telescopes in theBirmingham Solar Oscillations Network.
The IRSF is a 140-centimetre (55 in) reflector fitted with a 3-colour infrared imager.[17] Originally built as part of theMagellanic Clouds – A Thorough Study grant from theJapanese Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology in 2000.[18] Other studies the telescope participated in include:
Three 1-metre (39-inch) telescopes to form part of the LCOGT network were installed in early 2013.[20]
TheMASTER-SAAO Telescope (obs. code:K95) is part of theRussian Mobile Astronomical System of Telescope-Robots. It saw first light on 21 December 2014.[21] It consists of two paired 0.4-m telescopes.[22] In April 2015 it discovered the firstcomet from South Africa in 35 years,C/2015 G2 (MASTER).[23]
One of the two 1.20-metre (47-inch) telescopes of theMOnitoring NEtwork of Telescopes Project is located at Sutherland. Its twin can be found at theMcDonald Observatory in Texas.[24] The MONET telescopes areRobotic telescope controllable via the Internet and was constructed by theUniversity of Göttingen.[25]Remote Telescope Markup Language is used to control the telescopes remotely.[26]
PRime-focus Infrared Microlensing Experiments is a 1.8-metre (71-inch) telescope located in Sutherland.[27] PRIME achieved first light on October 8, 2022. Currently PRIME has anear-infrared camera located in its prime focus with a 1.29-square-degree field of view. The telescope is a collaboration betweenOsaka University,University of Maryland,[28] South African Astronomical Observatory,NASA Goddard Space Flight Center[29] andAstro-Biology Center. The project's primary science objective is the study of exoplanets usinggravitational microlensing.[30]
Two telescopes forming part ofProject Solaris is located at the Sutherland site.Solaris-1 andSolaris-2 are both 0.5m f/15Ritchey–Chrétien telescopes. The aims of Project Solaris is to detectcircumbinary planets aroundeclipsing binary stars and to characterise these binaries to improve stellar models.[31]
SALT was inaugurated in November 2005. It is the largest single optical telescope in the Southern Hemisphere, with a hexagonal mirror array 11 meters across. SALT shares similarities with theHobby-Eberly Telescope (HET) in Texas. The Southern African Large Telescope gathers twenty-five times as much light as any other existing African Telescope.[32] With this larger mirror array, SALT can record distantstars,galaxies andquasars.
TheWide Angle Search for Planets consists of tworobotic telescopes, one located at SAAOSutherland and the other atRoque de los Muchachos Observatory on the island ofLa Palma in theCanaries.[33]WASP-17b, the firstexoplanet known to have aretrograde orbit, was discovered in 2009 using this array.
KELT-South (Kilodegree Extremely Little Telescope – South) is a small robotic telescope that is designed to detect transiting extrasolar planets. The telescope is owned and operated byVanderbilt University and was based on the design of KELT-North, which was conceived and designed at theOhio State University, Department of Astronomy. The KELT-South telescope will serve as a counterpart to its northern twin, surveying the southern sky for transiting planets over the next few years.
Optical wide-field telescope, installed in 2017. It has a 60-centimetre (24-inch) effective aperture, and a 1.65-×-1.65-degree field-of-view, sampled at 0.56"/pix. It was designed and manufactured in the Netherlands (Radboud University & NOVA) and is run by a consortium of Radboud University, University of Cape Town, the NRF/SAAO, the University of Oxford, the University of Manchester, and the University of Amsterdam. It is the optical eye ofMeerKAT, and has as its main-purpose to twin with the MeerKAT radio array to achieve a simultaneous optical-radio coverage of the southern skies. It is the prototype of theBlackGEM array, installed atESO La Silla in Chile.
TheYonsei Survey Telescopes for Astronomical Research (YSTAR), decommissioned in 2012, was used for the monitoring of variable stars and other transient events. YSTAR was a joint project between SAAO and theYonsei University,Korea.[25]
The ATLAS asteroid impact early warning system, developed by the University of Hawaii and funded by NASA, consists of 4 telescopes; South Africa hosts ATLAS-Sutherland. In February 2023, the telescope observed the cometC/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan–ATLAS).[34][35]
The GeoForschungsZentrum, Potsdam in co-operation with theNational Research Foundation of South Africa constructed the SAGOS between 1998 and 2000.
SAGOS consist of a 1 Hz permanent GPS station, a superconducting gravimeter, meteorological sensors, and a tri-axial magnetometer. The GPS station is also used in support of theCHAllenging Minisatellite Payload (CHAMP) andGravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) space missions.[36]
The SUR station forms part of theInternational Deployment of Accelerometers Project and theGlobal Seismographic Network of theIncorporated Research Institutions for Seismology[37][38]
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 Photos of the dome of the Victoria telescope from theUniversity of Cambridge |
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