The National Astronomical Observatory (

Spanish Spanish might refer to: * Items from or related to Spain: **Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain **Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many Latin American countries **Spanish cuisine Other places * Spanish, Ontario, Can ...

: ''Observatorio Astronómico Nacional''—OAN) is an astronomical observatory in

Baja California Baja California (; 'Lower California'), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Baja California ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Baja California), is a state in Mexico. It is the northernmost and westernmost of the 32 federal entities of Mex ...

Mexico Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...

History

Mexico City

The observatory was first established on the balcony of

Chapultepec Castle Chapultepec Castle ( es, Castillo de Chapultepec) is located on top of Chapultepec Hill in Mexico City's Chapultepec park. The name ''Chapultepec'' is the Nahuatl word ''chapoltepēc'' which means "on the hill of the grasshopper". The castle has s ...

Mexico City Mexico City ( es, link=no, Ciudad de México, ; abbr.: CDMX; Nahuatl: ''Altepetl Mexico'') is the capital city, capital and primate city, largest city of Mexico, and the List of North American cities by population, most populous city in North Amer ...

in 1878. The observatory has been operated by the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) since 1929. It was later moved to Palacio del Ex-Arzobispado in

Tacubaya Tacubaya is a working-class area of west-central Mexico City, in the borough of Miguel Hidalgo, consisting of the '' colonia'' Tacubaya proper and adjacent areas in other colonias, with San Miguel Chapultepec sección II, Observatorio, Daniel Ga ...

, then on the outskirts of the city on the west side of the

Federal District A federal district is a type of administrative division of a federation, usually under the direct control of a federal government and organized sometimes with a single municipal body. Federal districts often include capital districts, and they ...

. The location is remembered by the name Metro Observatorio, the terminal station of the Line 1 of the

Mexico City Metro The Mexico City Metro ( es, Metro de la Ciudad de México) is a rapid transit system that serves the metropolitan area of Mexico City, including some municipalities in Mexico State. Operated by the Sistema de Transporte Colectivo (STC), it is ...

located nearby.

Puebla

In the middle of the 20th century, OAN had to move from the increasingly crowded and polluted

Valley of Mexico The Valley of Mexico ( es, Valle de México) is a highlands plateau in central Mexico roughly coterminous with present-day Mexico City and the eastern half of the State of Mexico. Surrounded by mountains and volcanoes, the Valley of Mexico w ...

, to Tonantzintla in Puebla state,

Central Mexico Central is an adjective usually referring to being in the center (disambiguation), center of some place or (mathematical) object. Central may also refer to: Directions and generalised locations * Central Africa, a region in the centre of Africa ...

Baja California

In 1967 excessive

air pollution Air pollution is the contamination of air due to the presence of substances in the atmosphere that are harmful to the health of humans and other living beings, or cause damage to the climate or to materials. There are many different typ ...

and night

light pollution Light pollution is the presence of unwanted, inappropriate, or excessive use of artificial Visible spectrum, lighting. In a descriptive sense, the term ''light pollution'' refers to the effects of any poorly implemented lighting, during the day ...

caused another move, from Puebla to atop the

Sierra San Pedro Mártir Sierra (Spanish for "mountain range" and " saw", from Latin '' serra'') may refer to the following: Places Mountains and mountain ranges * Sierra de Juárez, a mountain range in Baja California, Mexico * Sierra de las Nieves, a mountain rang ...

mountain range of

state in Northwestern Mexico. The San Pedro Mártir OAN site has been found to have excellent

astronomical seeing In astronomy, seeing is the degradation of the image of an astronomical object due to turbulence in the atmosphere of Earth that may become visible as blurring, twinkling or variable distortion. The origin of this effect are rapidly changing var ...

Telescopes

Current

There are six optical telescopes on the summit of the

at the OAN complex: * The telescope was built between 1974 and 1979 and is tied as Mexico's largest optical telescope. It has a Ritchey-Chrétien (RC) design, with

secondary mirror A secondary mirror (or secondary) is the second deflecting or focusing mirror element in a reflecting telescope. Light gathered by the primary mirror is directed towards a focal point typically past the location of the secondary. Secondary mirro ...

s of f/7.5, f/13.5 or f/30. Direct

imaging Imaging is the representation or reproduction of an object's form; especially a visual representation (i.e., the formation of an image). Imaging technology is the application of materials and methods to create, preserve, or duplicate images. ...

and optical spectroscopy are performed with a number of different

charge-couple device A charge-coupled device (CCD) is an integrated circuit containing an array of linked, or coupled, capacitors. Under the control of an external circuit, each capacitor can transfer its electric charge to a neighboring capacitor. CCD sensors are a ...

s and spectrographs. * The telescope was built by the

University of Arizona The University of Arizona (Arizona, U of A, UArizona, or UA) is a public land-grant research university in Tucson, Arizona. Founded in 1885 by the 13th Arizona Territorial Legislature, it was the first university in the Arizona Territory. T ...

(UA)

Lunar and Planetary Laboratory The Lunar and Planetary Laboratory (LPL) is a research center for planetary science located in Tucson, Arizona. It is also a graduate school, constituting the Department of Planetary Sciences at the University of Arizona. LPL is one of the wo ...

(LPL). It was installed in 1970 with the assistance of LPL. It has an RC design, and direct imaging, optical spectroscopy, and

photometry Photometry can refer to: * Photometry (optics), the science of measurement of visible light in terms of its perceived brightness to human vision * Photometry (astronomy), the measurement of the flux or intensity of an astronomical object's electro ...

are done with a f/13.5 secondary mirror. * The 1.0
SAINT-EX
telescope, which is the result of a collaboration between UNAM and the Universities of Bern (CH), Liège (BE), Cambridge (UK) and Geneva (CH). SAINT-EX's main scientific goal is to search for terrestrial planets orbiting ultra-cool stars such as TRAPPIST-1. SAINT-EX has started operations in Spring 2019. * The telescope was loaned to UNAM by UA in the late 1960s and was the first to be installed at the site. It has an RC design, and direct imaging, optical spectroscopy, and photometry are done with a f/15 secondary mirror. * The Javier Gorosabel Telescope is the fifth telescope in the BOOTES network. It has an f/8 RC design, and began operations in 2015. The BOOTES-5 project is a collaboration between the Institute of Astronomy of the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), the Institute of Astrophysics of Andalusia (IAA), Spain, and the

Sungkyunkwan University Sungkyunkwan University (SKKU or simply ''Seongdae'', Hangul: 성균관대학교; Hanja: 成均館大學校) is a private comprehensive research university in South Korea. The institution traces its origins to the historic Sungkyunkwan, found ...

(SKKU) in South Korea. * The COATLI telescope is a collaboration between the UNAM Institute of Astronomy and Arizona State University. It began operations in 2016 and has an f/8 RC design. * The Deca-Degree Optical Transient Imager (DDOTI) will consist of six f/2.2

Celestron Celestron is an American company based in Torrance, California, United States, that manufactures telescopes and distributes telescopes, binoculars, spotting scopes, microscopes, and accessories manufactured by its parent company, the Synta Technol ...

Rowe-Ackermann

Schmidt Schmidt may refer to: * Schmidt (surname), including list of people with the surname * Schmidt (singer) (born 1990), German pop and jazz singer * Schmidt (lunar crater), a small lunar impact crater * Schmidt (Martian crater), a List of craters on ...

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 single mount, two of which became operational in 2017. This project is a collaboration between the UNAM Institute of Astronomy, Arizona State University, the

University of Maryland The University of Maryland, College Park (University of Maryland, UMD, or simply Maryland) is a public land-grant research university in College Park, Maryland. Founded in 1856, UMD is the flagship institution of the University System of M ...

, the

Laboratoire d'Astrophysique de Marseille Marseille Observatory (french: Observatoire de Marseille) is an astronomical observatory located in Marseille, France, with a history that goes back to the early 18th century. In its 1877 incarnation, it was the discovery site of a group of gala ...

, and the

Haute-Provence Observatory The Haute-Provence Observatory (OHP, french: Observatoire de Haute-Provence) is an astronomical observatory in the southeast of France, about 90 km east of Avignon and 100 km north of Marseille. It was established in 1937 as a national ...

Under construction

Construction has begun on the new San Pedro Martir Telescope (SPMT), a large infrared survey telescope at the OAN complex, with first light planned for the 2017-2020 period. Mirror fabrication for the SPMT began in 2009, with a 6.5 m aperture optimized for wide angle infrared survey work. The primary instrument would be a 124 x 2k x 2k pixel infrared detector array with a 1 degree FOV prosecuting the Synoptic All-Sky Infrared Survey (SASIR), a four-year, deep all-sky survey. As of November 2017, the project is still awaiting funding, but construction is expected to be completed by 2023.Universities in U.S. and Mexico Partner on Telescope Project
Arizona Public Media, 13 November 2017.

References

External links

Astrossp.unam: Official OAN SPM homepage
— ''Observatorio Astronómico Nacional, San Pedro Mártir''.
Astroscu.unam: UNAM Institute of Astronomy

UNAM—Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México homepage
{{Authority control Astronomical observatories in Mexico Buildings and structures in Baja California National Autonomous University of Mexico Education in Baja California 1878 establishments in Mexico