IceCube Neutrino Observatory - IceCube. LIGO detects more gravitational waves, from even more ancient and distant black hole collisions. For the third time in a year and a half, the Advanced Laser Interferometer Gravitational Wave Observatory has detected gravitational waves. Hypothesized by Einstein a century ago, the identification of these ripples in space-time – for the third time, no less – is fulfilling the promise of an area of astronomy that has enticed scientists for decades, but had always seemed to lie just out of our reach. As a gravitational-wave astrophysicist and member of the LIGO Scientific Collaboration, I am naturally thrilled to see the vision of so many of us becoming a reality.
But I’m accustomed to finding my own work more interesting and exciting than other people do, so the extent to which the whole world seems to be fascinated by this accomplishment came as something of a surprise. The excitement is well-deserved, though. Already these discoveries have affected our understanding of the universe. And LIGO is just getting started. Tuning in to the universe Detecting the tiniest fluctuations. How we discovered 840 minor planets beyond Neptune – and what they can tell us. Our solar system is a tiny but wonderfully familiar corner of the vast, dark universe – we have even been able to land spacecraft on our celestial neighbours. Yet its outer reaches are still remarkably unmapped. Now we have discovered 840 small worlds in the distant and hard-to-explore region beyond Neptune.
This is the largest set of discoveries ever made, increasing the number of distant objects with well known paths around the sun by 50%. These little icy worlds are important as they help us tell the solar system’s history. Our planetary system as we see it today is not as it formed. Planetary migration also happened in far away systems around many other stars. Mapping the sky The new discoveries were made as part of a five year project called the Outer Solar System Origins Survey (OSSOS). Our new survey successfully tracked all its distant discoveries. Strange new worlds The new icy and rocky objects fall into two main groups. In the Kuiper belt, we found 436 small worlds. NEOWISE. The Pan-STARRS1 data archive home page. Astrophysics Group » MRAO Telescopes. A radio telescope consists of one or more directional receiving aerials connected to very sensitive amplifiers. Since radio wavelengths range from millimetres to about 10 metres, the actual form of the aerials can vary greatly; many are parabolic dishes with very precise surfaces, while others, like the Cambridge Low-Frequency Synthesis Telescope (right), are similar to television aerials.
The ability to “see” fine detail in sources depends on the ratio of the size of the telescope to the radio wavelength, and in order to make this as good as possible a method known as aperture synthesis was developed at Cambridge. The principle behind this method is that we use several smaller aerials, linked together, and record the signals as the aerials are moved relative to each other by moving the aerials along a rail track and by the rotation of the Earth. The expertise gained in making radio images is now also being applied to the related problems of optical astronomy. Why radio? Gallery – National Radio Astronomy Observatory. Home - The Dark Energy Survey. The Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope. Welcome to VERITAS. TELESCOPES | THE OBSERVATORY SCIENCE CENTRE.
Thompson 26-inch Refracting TelescopeThe Thompson 26-inch Refracting Telescope, situated in Dome E is open to the public during the day and is used on Open Evenings. Learn more about it on one of our telescope tours. This telescope is one of the largest refracting telescopes in the world and the second largest in Great Britain. Between 1897 and 1988 it was used to take 60,000 photographs of the night sky. Constructed in 1896 by Sir Howard Grubb of Dublin at a cost of £5,000, it was the gift of 1st Baronet Sir Henry Thompson, a London surgeon and amateur astronomer. The objective lens, a doublet has an aperture of 66cm (26 inches) and is fixed inside the top of a large grey tube.
The focal length is 6.82m. The tube is so long that the telescope has to be mounted high up in the dome in order for it to move freely. A smaller guiding telescope rides piggyback on the 26-inch tube. In the period 1930-1931 the asteroid Eros passed close to Earth. Australian Astronomical Observatory | Home. Event Horizon Telescope. The Liverpool Telescope. CSIRO Parkes Observatory | Australia Telescope National Facility. Green Bank Observatory. James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) NASA. MAGIC - The MAGIC Telescope Web Server on La Palma. Gaia. SDO | Solar Dynamics Observatory.
SDSS. FAST - Homepage. Event Horizon Telescope. Kepler Space Telescope. ALMA Observatory. SuperWASP. Leo Space Telescope. ESA/Hubble. National Astronomy and Ionosphere Center (Arecibo Observatory) Gran Telescopio CANARIAS. Home - Jodrell Bank. SOFIA (Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy) HI-SEAS. James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) NASA. Green Bank Telescope.