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Las Campanas Observatory

Coordinates: 29°00′57″S 70°41′31″W / 29.01597°S 70.69208°W / -29.01597; -70.69208
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Las Campanas Observatory
Telescopes at Las Campanas Observatory
Alternative namesLCO Edit this at Wikidata
Organization
Observatory code 304, I05 Edit this on Wikidata
LocationAtacama Region, Chile
Coordinates29°00′57″S 70°41′31″W / 29.01597°S 70.69208°W / -29.01597; -70.69208
Altitude2,380 m (7,810 ft) Edit this at Wikidata
Established1969 Edit this on Wikidata
Websitewww.lco.cl Edit this at Wikidata
Telescopes
Las Campanas Observatory is located in Chile
Las Campanas Observatory
Location of Las Campanas Observatory
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Las Campanas Observatory (LCO) is an astronomical observatory managed by the Carnegie Institution for Science (CIS). Located in Chile's Atacama Region, it sits about 100 kilometres (62 mi) northeast of the city of La Serena. The LCO's telescopes and facilities are positioned near the northern end of a 7 km (4.3 mi) mountain ridge. Cerro Las Campanas, situated near the southern end of this ridge and standing over 2,500 m (8,200 ft) tall, will be the future site of the Giant Magellan Telescope.[1]

Established in 1969, LCO is CIS's primary observatory, having taken over this role from Mount Wilson Observatory due to increasing light pollution in the Los Angeles area. The headquarters of Carnegie Observatories is in Pasadena, California, while the main office in Chile is in La Serena, close to the University of La Serena and near the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy facility.[2]

The observatory is served by Pelicano Airport, located 23 kilometres (14 mi) to the southwest.

Telescopes

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Tenant telescopes

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Former telescopes

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Future telescopes

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  • The Giant Magellan Telescope is an extremely large telescope under construction[20] at LCO, with commissioning expected to begin in 2029. It is 24.5 m (80 ft) effective aperture design with seven 8.4 m (28 ft) segments. The telescope will have a light-gathering area of 368 m2 (3,960 sq ft), which is roughly fifteen times greater than one of the Magellan telescopes. The mirrors are being fabricated by the Steward Observatory Mirror Laboratory, and the first was started in 2005.[21]

Discoveries

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On February 24, 1987 at LCO, Ian Shelton and Oscar Duhalde became the first official observers of Supernova 1987A (SN 1987A).[18]

On August 17, 2017 at LCO, SSS17a, the optical counterpart to the gravitational wave source GW170817, was discovered with the Swope telescope.[22]

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See also

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References

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  1. ^ Overbye, D., Zegers, M. (April 18, 2023), "A Giant Telescope Grows in Chile", The New York Times, retrieved 22 April 2023
  2. ^ "History | The Carnegie Observatories". The Carnegie Observatories. Retrieved 2012-01-24.
  3. ^ "Magellan Telescopes (6.5m) | The Carnegie Observatories". The Carnegie Observatories. Retrieved 2012-01-24.
  4. ^ "Magellan Telescopes — Las Campanas Observatory". Las Campanas Observatory. Retrieved 2012-01-24.
  5. ^ "The du Pont Telescope | The Carnegie Observatories". The Carnegie Observatories. Retrieved 2012-01-24.
  6. ^ "The Irénée du Pont Telescope — Las Campanas Observatory". Las Campanas Observatory. Retrieved 2012-01-24.
  7. ^ "The Swope Telescope | The Carnegie Observatories". The Carnegie Observatories. Retrieved 2012-01-24.
  8. ^ "The Henrietta Swope Telescope — Las Campanas Observatory". Las Campanas Observatory. Retrieved 2012-01-24.
  9. ^ "General Description of OGLE". Warsaw University Observatory. Retrieved 2012-01-24.
  10. ^ "All Sky Automated Survey - The ASAS-3 System". Warsaw University Observatory. Retrieved 2012-01-24.
  11. ^ "HAT-South homepage". Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. Archived from the original on 2014-02-18. Retrieved 2012-01-24.
  12. ^ "High-Resolution Optical Spectroscopy - University of Birmingham". University of Birmingham. Retrieved 2012-01-24.
  13. ^ Kollmeier, Juna A.; Zasowski, Gail; Rix, Hans-Walter; Johns, Matt; Anderson, Scott F.; Drory, Niv; Johnson, Jennifer A.; Pogge, Richard W.; Bird, Jonathan C.; Blanc, Guillermo A.; Brownstein, Joel R.; Crane, Jeffrey D.; De Lee, Nathan M.; Klaene, Mark A.; Kreckel, Kathryn; MacDonald, Nick; Merloni, Andrea; Ness, Melissa K.; O'Brien, Thomas; Sanchez-Gallego, Jose R.; Sayres, Conor C.; Shen, Yue; Thakar, Ani R.; Tkachenko, Andrew; Aerts, Conny; Blanton, Michael R.; Eisenstein, Daniel J.; Holtzman, Jon A.; Maoz, Dan; et al. (2017). "SDSS-V: pioneering panoptic spectroscopy". arXiv:1711.03234 [astro-ph.GA].
  14. ^ "SDSS-V Pioneering panoptic spectroscopy". Bulletin of the AAS. 51 (7). 2020.
  15. ^ Herbst, T.; Bilgi, Pavaman (2020). "The SDSS-V local volume mapper telescope system". In Marshall, Heather K; Spyromilio, Jason; Usuda, Tomonori (eds.). Ground-based and Airborne Telescopes VIII. Vol. 11445. SPIE. p. 114450J. doi:10.1117/12.2561419. ISBN 9781510636774. S2CID 230583048.
  16. ^ "The NANTEN2 Telescope | NANTEN". University of Birmingham. Retrieved 2012-01-24.
  17. ^ "Complejo Astronómico El Leoncito - Helen Sawyer Hogg Telescope". Complejo Astronómico El Leoncito. Retrieved 2012-01-23.
  18. ^ a b "SN1987A's Twentieth Anniversary". ESO Press Release: 8. 2007. Bibcode:2007eso..pres....8.
  19. ^ "Pi of the Sky". Pi of the Sky. Archived from the original on 2012-12-21. Retrieved 2012-01-24.
  20. ^ "The Giant Magellan Telescope Organization Breaks Ground in Chile" (Press release). GMTO Corporation. 11 November 2015.
  21. ^ "Overview - Giant Magellan Telescope". GMTO Corporation. Archived from the original on 2011-06-09. Retrieved 2012-01-24.
  22. ^ Coulter, D. A.; Foley, R. J.; Kilpatrick, C. D.; Drout, M. R.; Piro, A. L.; Shappee, B. J.; Siebert, M. R.; Simon, J. D.; Ulloa, N. (2017-10-16). "Swope Supernova Survey 2017a (SSS17a), the optical counterpart to a gravitational wave source". Science. 358 (6370): 1556–1558. arXiv:1710.05452. Bibcode:2017Sci...358.1556C. doi:10.1126/science.aap9811. ISSN 0036-8075. PMID 29038368. S2CID 206664790.
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