Las Campanas Observatory (LCO) is an

astronomical Astronomy () is a natural science that studies celestial objects and phenomena. It uses mathematics, physics, and chemistry in order to explain their origin and evolution. Objects of interest include planets, moons, stars, nebulae, galaxies ...

observatory An observatory is a location used for observing terrestrial, marine, or celestial events. Astronomy, climatology/meteorology, geophysical, oceanography and volcanology are examples of disciplines for which observatories have been constructed. His ...

owned and operated by the

Carnegie Institution for Science The Carnegie Institution of Washington (the organization's legal name), known also for public purposes as the Carnegie Institution for Science (CIS), is an organization in the United States established to fund and perform scientific research. Th ...

(CIS). It is in the southern

Atacama Desert The Atacama Desert ( es, Desierto de Atacama) is a desert plateau in South America covering a 1,600 km (990 mi) strip of land on the Pacific coast, west of the Andes Mountains. The Atacama Desert is the driest nonpolar desert in the ...

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the east a ...

in the Atacama Region approximately northeast of the city of La Serena. The LCO telescopes and other facilities are near the north end of a long mountain ridge. Cerro Las Campanas, near the southern end and over high, is the future home of the

Giant Magellan Telescope The Giant Magellan Telescope (GMT) is a ground-based extremely large telescope under construction, as part of the US Extremely Large Telescope Program (US-ELTP), . It will consist of seven 8.4 m (27.6 ft) diameter primary segments, that ...

. LCO was established in 1969 and is the primary observing facility of CIS. It supplanted

Mount Wilson Observatory The Mount Wilson Observatory (MWO) is an astronomical observatory in Los Angeles County, California, United States. The MWO is located on Mount Wilson, a peak in the San Gabriel Mountains near Pasadena, northeast of Los Angeles. The observat ...

in that role due to increasing light pollution in the

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...

area. The headquarters of Carnegie Observatories is located in

Pasadena, California Pasadena ( ) is a city in Los Angeles County, California, northeast of downtown Los Angeles. It is the most populous city and the primary cultural center of the San Gabriel Valley. Old Pasadena is the city's original commercial district. I ...

, while the main office in

is in La Serena next to the University of La Serena and a short distance from the

Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy The Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy (AURA) is a consortium of universities and other institutions that operates astronomical observatories and telescopes. Founded October 10, 1957, with the encouragement of the National Sc ...

facility. It is served by Pelicano Airport, to the southwest.

Telescopes

* The

Magellan Telescopes The Magellan Telescopes are a pair of optical telescopes located at Las Campanas Observatory in Chile. The two telescopes are named after the astronomer Walter Baade and the philanthropist Landon T. Clay. First light for the telescopes was on Se ...

are two identical single-mirror reflecting telescopes. The

Walter Baade Wilhelm Heinrich Walter Baade (March 24, 1893 – June 25, 1960) was a German astronomer who worked in the United States from 1931 to 1959. Biography The son of a teacher, Baade finished school in 1912. He then studied maths, physics and astro ...

Telescope saw first light in 2000, and the Landon Clay Telescope in 2002. They are managed by LCO for an international consortium of institutions which includes LCO. * The du Pont Telescope is named after industrialist

Irénée du Pont Irénée du Pont I (December 21, 1876 – December 19, 1963) was an American businessman, president of the DuPont company and head of the Du Pont trust. Early life Irénée du Pont I was born on December 21, 1876, in New Castle, Delaware, the so ...

and has been in operation since 1977. It is a Ritchey-Chrétien telescope with a

Gascoigne Gascoigne (pronounced, and sometimes spelt, Gascoine or Gascoyne) is a British surname of Old French origin, the regional name of Gascony. The surname first appears on record in England in the early 13th century. ''Gascoigne'' or ''Gascoine'' m ...

corrector lens, and was built by Boller & Chivens and L&F Industries. * The Swope Telescope was the first telescope installed at LCO, and began operating in 1971. It is named after CIS astronomer

Henrietta Swope Henrietta Hill Swope (October 26, 1902 – November 24, 1980) was an American astronomer who studied variable stars. In particular, she measured the period-luminosity relation for Cepheid stars, which are bright variable stars whose periods of va ...

. It is a Ritchey-Chrétien telescope built by Boller & Chivens with a

corrector lens.

Tenant telescopes

* The Warsaw Telescope is the main instrument of the

Optical Gravitational Lensing Experiment The Optical Gravitational Lensing Experiment (OGLE) is a Polish astronomical project based at the University of Warsaw that runs a long-term variability sky survey (1992–present). The main goals are the detection and classification of variable ...

operated by the

University of Warsaw The University of Warsaw ( pl, Uniwersytet Warszawski, la, Universitas Varsoviensis) is a public university in Warsaw, Poland. Established in 1816, it is the largest institution of higher learning in the country offering 37 different fields of ...

Observatory. Installed in 1996, it is a Ritchey-Chrétien design built by

DFM Engineering DFM Engineering is an American telescope and optics manufacturer founded in 1979 by Frank Melsheimer in Longmont, Colorado. DFM makes medium size Cassegrain telescopes and their associated systems including telescope optics, control systems, and ...

. Exact location: ± 1 meter, altitude of the base of the building over mean sea level. * The All Sky Automated Survey (ASAS) is a project to monitor the southern sky for

variable stars A variable star is a star whose brightness as seen from Earth (its apparent magnitude) changes with time. This variation may be caused by a change in emitted light or by something partly blocking the light, so variable stars are classified as e ...

. It consists of two wide-field telescopes, one narrow field telescope, and one ultra-wide field telescope. A prototype system was installed in 1996 and a second in 1997, both in the same enclosure as the 10-inch astrograph. The three larger telescopes were installed in 2000. The ultra-wide device was added in 2002 when the existing telescopes were moved to a new, smaller enclosure. Location: ± 5 meter. * The Hungarian Automated Telescope South (HAT-South) facility is part of the

HATNet Project The Hungarian Automated Telescope Network (HATNet) project is a network of six small fully automated "HAT" telescopes. The scientific goal of the project is to detect and characterize extrasolar planets using the transit method. This network is use ...

to detect

exoplanet An exoplanet or extrasolar planet is a planet outside the Solar System. The first possible evidence of an exoplanet was noted in 1917 but was not recognized as such. The first confirmation of detection occurred in 1992. A different planet, init ...

s using the

transit method Any planet is an extremely faint light source compared to its parent star. For example, a star like the Sun is about a billion times as bright as the reflected light from any of the planets orbiting it. In addition to the intrinsic difficulty o ...

. It consists of a pair of four Takahasi reflecting

astrograph An astrograph (or astrographic camera) is a telescope designed for the sole purpose of astrophotography. Astrographs are mostly used in wide-field astronomical surveys of the sky and for detection of objects such as asteroids, meteors, a ...

s on a common mount. It was installed in 2009. * The

Birmingham Solar Oscillations Network The Birmingham Solar Oscillations Network (BiSON) consists of a network of six remote solar observatories monitoring low-degree solar oscillation modes. It is operated by the High Resolution Optical Spectroscopy group of the School of Physics ...

(BiSON) operates at station at LCO.

Former telescopes

* The NANTEN millimeter-wavelength

radio telescope A radio telescope is a specialized antenna and radio receiver used to detect radio waves from astronomical radio sources in the sky. Radio telescopes are the main observing instrument used in radio astronomy, which studies the radio frequency ...

was located at LCO from 1995 to 2004. It is now located at the Pampa La Bola site of the

Llano de Chajnantor Observatory Llano de Chajnantor Observatory is the name for a group of astronomical observatories located at an altitude of over 4,800 m (15,700 ft) in the Atacama Desert of northern Chile. The site is in the Antofagasta Region approximately 50 kil ...

and is known as the

NANTEN2 Observatory The NANTEN2 Observatory is a southern sky observatory in the Atacama Desert of northern Chile. It is located at an altitude of on Pampa la Bola next to Cerro Chajnantor. The observatory is equipped with a millimeter and submillimeter wave teles ...

. * The Helen Sawyer Hogg Telescope (HSHT) was operated at LCO by the

University of Toronto Southern Observatory The University of Toronto Southern Observatory (UTSO) was an astronomical observatory built by the University of Toronto at the Las Campanas Observatory in Chile. It hosted a single 60 cm Cassegrain telescope and a small cottage for the ope ...

from 1971 to 1997. It is now located at

Leoncito Astronomical Complex The El Leoncito Astronomical Complex (Spanish: Complejo Astronómico El Leoncito - CASLEO) is an astronomical observatory in the San Juan Province of Argentina. CASLEO is one of two observatories located within El Leoncito National Park, which i ...

. * A astrograph operated at the site for some time, and was used to discover Supernova 1987A (

SN 1987A SN 1987A was a type II supernova in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a dwarf satellite galaxy of the Milky Way. It occurred approximately from Earth and was the closest observed supernova since Kepler's Supernova. 1987A's light reached Earth on Feb ...

). * The Pi of the Sky project operated two wide-angle cameras that searched for the optical signature of

gamma ray bursts In gamma-ray astronomy, gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) are immensely energetic explosions that have been observed in distant galaxies. They are the most energetic and luminous electromagnetic events since the Big Bang. Bursts can last from ten milli ...

at LCO starting in 2004. The installation was moved to a commercial telescope hosting site in

San Pedro de Atacama San Pedro de Atacama is a Chilean town and commune in El Loa Province, Antofagasta Region. It is located east of Antofagasta, some 106 km (60 mi) southeast of Calama and the Chuquicamata copper mine, overlooking the Licancabur volcano. ...

in 2011.

Future telescopes

* The

is an

extremely large telescope The Extremely Large Telescope (ELT) is an astronomical observatory currently under construction. When completed, it is planned to be the world's largest optical/near-infrared extremely large telescope. Part of the European Southern Observator ...

under construction at LCO, with commissioning expected to begin in 2029. It is effective

aperture In optics, an aperture is a hole or an opening through which light travels. More specifically, the aperture and focal length of an optical system determine the cone angle of a bundle of rays that come to a focus in the image plane. An opt ...

design with seven segments. The telescope will have a light-gathering area of , which is roughly fifteen times greater than one of the Magellan telescopes. The mirrors are being fabricated by the

Steward Observatory Steward Observatory is the research arm of the Department of Astronomy at the University of Arizona (UArizona). Its offices are located on the UArizona campus in Tucson, Arizona (US). Established in 1916, the first telescope and building were f ...

Mirror Laboratory, and the first was started in 2005. * The Local Volume Mapper of the SDSS-V will consist of 4 telescopes (siderostats) with 0.16 m diameter each near .

Discoveries

On February 24, 1987 at LCO,

Ian Shelton Ian Keith Shelton (born 30 March 1957) is a Canadian astronomer who discovered SN 1987A, the first modern supernova close and bright enough to be visible to the naked eye. Born in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, Shelton received his B.Sc. in 1979 fro ...

and Oscar Duhalde became the first official observers of Supernova 1987A (

). On August 17, 2017 at LCO,

SSS17a GW 170817 was a gravitational wave (GW) signal observed by the LIGO and Virgo detectors on 17 August 2017, originating from the shell elliptical galaxy . The signal was produced by the last minutes of a binary pair of neutron stars' insp ...

, the optical counterpart to the gravitational wave source

GW170817 GW 170817 was a gravitational wave (GW) signal observed by the LIGO and Virgo detectors on 17 August 2017, originating from the shell elliptical galaxy . The signal was produced by the last minutes of a binary pair of neutron stars' inspir ...

, was discovered with the Swope telescope.

Gallery

File:Du Pont Las Campanas.jpg, du Pont telescope File:Warszawskie Obserwatorium Południowe.jpg, Warsaw telescope dome and control building File:Warszawskie Obserwatorium Południowe Teleskop.jpg, Warsaw telescope File:Clay telescope.jpg, Clay telescope (one of the Magellan telescopes) File:Magellan telescopes.jpg, Magellan telescopes File:Telescopio Polaco Las Campanas.jpg, Magellan telescopes, Warsaw and Swope telescopes (LTR) File:Teleskopy ASAS OGLE.jpg, ASAS telescopes File:BiSON Las Campanas Station.jpg, BiSON Solar Telescope

References

External links

The Carnegie Observatories

Carnegie Institution for Science
{{Authority control 1971 establishments in Chile Astronomical observatories in Chile Buildings and structures in Coquimbo Region