Related papers: New optical telescope projects at Devasthal Observ…
The TIFR Near Infrared Imaging Camera-II (TIRCAM2) is being used at the 3.6 m Devasthal Optical Telescope (DOT) operated by Aryabhatta Research Institute of Observational Sciences (ARIES), Nainital, Uttarakhand, India. Earlier, the TIRCAM2…
Astronomical facilities at the high-altitude observatory Terskol in the Northern Caucasus include optical telescopes with diameters up to 2 m, their instrumentation (high-resolution spectrometers, high-speed photometers, CCDs, etc.), as…
The new 1.5~m telescope (AZ1500) is operating at the National Astronomical Observatory Rozhen, Bulgaria. This paper gives an overview of the telescope and presents a snapshot of the current performance. Science observations are under way,…
A very unique strength of the Devasthal Observatory is its capability of detecting optical transients with the 4-m International Liquid Mirror Telescope (ILMT) and to rapidly follow them up using the 1.3-m Devasthal Fast Optical Telescope…
I review the present status of liquid mirror telescopes. In a nutshell: LMTs do work and several have been built and used. Extensive interferometric tests of liquid mirrors (the largest one having a diameter of 2.5 meters) show diffraction…
TIRCAM2 is the facility near-infrared Imager at the Devasthal 3.6-m telescope in northern India, equipped with an Aladdin III InSb array detector. We have pioneered the use of TIRCAM2 for very fast photometry, with the aim of recording…
This project is focused on evaluating the slowly-varying ground layer seeing component at the optical telescopes of ARIES. To achieve this, we assembled the instrument, consisting of a filter wheel, a CCD camera, and a tip-tilt enabled…
I argue that there is a crisis in optical Astronomy due to a paucity of telescopes and thus the need for a paradigm shift in telescope technology. Large increases in collecting areas and observing time/astronomer are only possible if we…
The Aryabhatta Research Institute of Observational Sciences (ARIES), a premier autonomous research institute under the Department of Science and Technology, Government of India has a legacy of about seven decades with contributions made in…
A large wide-field telescope and camera with optical throughput over 200 m^2 deg^2 -- a factor of 50 beyond what we currently have -- would enable the detection of faint moving or bursting optical objects: from Earth threatening asteroids…
We present here the preliminary design of ARIES-Devasthal Faint Object Spectrograph and Camera (ADFOSC), which is a multi-mode instrument for both imaging and spectroscopy. ADFOSC is the first-generation instrument to be mounted at the…
The Advanced Technology Large-Aperture Space Telescope (ATLAST) is a set of mission concepts for the next generation of UVOIR space observatory with a primary aperture diameter in the 8-m to 16-m range that will allow us to perform some of…
MISTRAL is the new Faint Object Spectroscopic Camera mounted at the folded Cassegrain focus of the 1.93m telescope of Haute-Provence Observatory. We describe the design and components of the instrument and give some details about its…
The 4m International Liquid Mirror Telescope (ILMT) is the first optical survey telescope in India that performs zenithal observations of a 22$'$ wide strip of the sky. To determine the portion of the sky covered by the ILMT during the…
The Calar Alto Observatory, located at 2168m height above the sea level in continental Europe, holds a significant number of astronomical telescopes and experiments, covering a large range of the electromagnetic domain, from gamma-ray to…
DECal is a new calibration system for the CTIO 4 m Blanco telescope. It is currently being installed as part of the Dark Energy Survey and will provide both broadband flat fields and narrowband (about 1 nm bandwidth) spectrophotometric…
With plans to build a large IR/optical telescope in the Atacama Desert, a site survey campaign has been underway since 1998 to characterize the optical seeing and the IR transparency in the Chajnantor Plateau region. Preliminary results…
In order to avoid collisions with space debris, the near Earth orbit must be continuously scanned by either ground- or spaced-based facilities. For the low Earth orbit, radar telescopes are the workhorse for this task, especially due to…
This paper reports on the current status of the World Space Observatory WSO-UV, a space mission for UV astronomy, planned for launch at the beginning of next decade. It is based on a 1.7 m telescope, with focal plane instruments including…
We present preliminary results of observations made, during the spring of 1996, with the 3-m liquid mirror telescope of the NASA Orbital Debris Observatory. A 20-arcmin-wide strip of sky was observed at latitude of 32deg56 N using 10…