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The government of South Africa has identified astronomy as a field in which their country has a strategic advantage and is consequently investing very significantly in astronomical infrastructure. South Africa now operates a 10-m class…
Southern Africa has some of the world's best sites for air Cherenkov telescopes. South Africa has only one viable site, which is south of Sutherland and also close to the Southern African Large Telescope (SALT). This site has very good…
I describe the last years of the 370-year long life of the Sterrekundig Instituut Utrecht, which was the second-oldest university observatory in the world and was closed in early 2012 after the Faculty of Science and the Board of Utrecht…
The Observatory Science Operations (OSO) subsystem of the SKAO consists of a range of complex tools which will be used to propose, design, schedule and execute observations. Bridging the gap between the science and telescope domains is the…
The Southern Wide-field Gamma-ray Observatory (SWGO) Collaboration is currently engaged in design and prototyping work towards the realisation of this future gamma-ray facility. SWGO will complement CTA and the existing ground-particle…
The progress of optical astronomy in post-apartheid South Africa is discussed. Particular emphasis is given to the socio-political climate which embraced the idea of a 10-m class telescope as a flagship project that would lead to widespread…
The Square Kilometre Array Observatory (SKAO) is perhaps the most ambitious radio telescope envisaged yet. It will enable unprecedented studies of the Sun, the corona and the heliosphere and help to answer many of the outstanding questions…
The Square Kilometre Array telescopes have recently started their construction phase, after years of pre-construction effort. The new SKA Observatory (SKAO) intergovernmental organisation has been created, and the start of construction…
Observatories, Institutes and Centers that support major astronomical facilities have, for decades, played a key role in maximizing the scientific return from their facilities and telescopes. It is crucial to realize that an "observatory"…
We present the lessons learned about the degradation observed in several space solar missions, based on contributions at the Workshop about On-Orbit Degradation of Solar and Space Weather Instruments that took place at the Solar Terrestrial…
Astronomy is the study of the Universe and all the objects that it comprises. Our attention is therefore usually focused beyond Earth, home to the only form of life known today. However, how can we continue to explore the secrets of the…
The Habitable Worlds Observatory is the first telescope ever designed to search for life and will be a powerhouse of discovery across topics in astrophysics. The observatory was the top recommendation of the Astro2020 Decadal Survey for…
We present the site quality of the Zadko Observatory, focusing on the brightness of the sky and the effects of the weather on the efficiency of the Observatory. We discuss these effects and their consequences for the scientific goals of the…
The scientific potential of a wide field-of-view, and very-high duty cycle, ground-based gamma-ray detector has been demonstrated by the current generation of instruments, such as HAWC and ARGO, and will be further extended in the Northern…
Xinglong Observatory of the National Astronomical Observatories, Chinese Academy of Sciences (NAOC), is one of the major optical observatories in China, which hosts nine optical telescopes including the Large Sky Area Multi-Object Fiber…
Astrophysics facilities have been of tremendous importance for planetary science. The flagship space observatory Hubble Space Telescope has produced ground-breaking Solar System science, but when launched it did not even have the capability…
The Habitable Worlds Observatory (HWO), NASA's next flagship science mission, follows in the tradition of the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope and other preceding great observatories. HWO will directly image and characterize Earth-like…
Over the past decades and even centuries, the astronomical community has accumulated a signif-icant heritage of recorded observations of a great many astronomical objects. Those records con-tain irreplaceable information about long-term…
The SKA Observatory (SKAO), a landmark project in radio astronomy, seeks to address fundamental questions in astronomy. To process its immense data output, approximately 700 PB/year, a global network of SKA Regional Centres (SR-CNet) will…
Habitable Worlds Observatory (HWO) will be NASA's flagship space telescope of the 2040s, designed to search for life on other planets and to transform broad areas of astrophysics. NASA are seeking international partners, and the UK is…