The Automated Planet Finder (APF) Telescope a.k.a. Rocky Planet Finder, is a fully

robotic Robotics is an interdisciplinary branch of computer science and engineering. Robotics involves design, construction, operation, and use of robots. The goal of robotics is to design machines that can help and assist humans. Robotics integrate ...

2.4-meter optical telescope at Lick Observatory, situated on the summit of Mount Hamilton, east of San Jose, California, USA.Steven S. Vogt et al.,
APF - The Lick Observatory Automated Planet Finder
', 26 February 2014. It is designed to search for

extrasolar planets 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 ...

in the range of five to twenty times the mass of the

Earth Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbor life. While large volumes of water can be found throughout the Solar System, only Earth sustains liquid surface water. About 71% of Earth's surfa ...

. The instrument will examine about 10 stars per night. Over the span of a decade, the telescope is expected to study 1,000 nearby stars for planets. Its estimated cost was $10 million. The total cost-to-completion of the APF project was $12.37 million. First light was originally scheduled for 2006, but delays in the construction of the major components of the telescope pushed this back to August 2013. It was commissioned in August 2013. The telescope uses high-precision radial velocity measurements to measure the gravitational reflex motion of nearby stars caused by the orbiting of planets. The design goal is to detect stellar motions as small as one meter per second, comparable to a slow walking speed. The main targets will be stars within about 100 light years of the Earth. Early tests show that the performance of the Ken and Gloria Levy Doppler Spectrometer is meeting the design goals. The spectrometer has high throughput and is meeting the design sensitivity of (1.0 m/s), similar to the radial velocity precision of

HARPS The High Accuracy Radial Velocity Planet Searcher (HARPS) is a high-precision echelle planet-finding spectrograph installed in 2002 on the ESO's 3.6m telescope at La Silla Observatory in Chile. The first light was achieved in February 2003. ...

and

HIRES Hires may refer to: * High Resolution Fly's Eye, ultra-high-energy cosmic ray observatory * High Resolution Echelle Spectrometer or High Resolution Echelle Spectrograph, W. M. Keck Observatory's spectrometer * Hires Big H, restaurant chain headquar ...

Construction

Parts for the telescopes were constructed by international companies: *The mirror blank was cast in Russia. *The blank was optical figured in Maryland, USA. *Assembly was performed in Arizona, USA. *The dome was built in Australia. *The spectrograph was designed and built in

California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...

. *It is located on Mount Hamilton in California.

Collaboration with Breakthrough Listen

The telescope is also being used to search for optical signals coming from

laser A laser is a device that emits light through a process of optical amplification based on the stimulated emission of electromagnetic radiation. The word "laser" is an acronym for "light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation". The fi ...

transmissions from hypothetical extraterrestrial civilizations ( search for extraterrestrial intelligence - SETI). This undertaking is performed for the heavily funded

Breakthrough Listen Breakthrough Listen is a project to search for intelligent extraterrestrial communications in the Universe. With $100 million in funding and thousands of hours of dedicated telescope time on state-of-the-art facilities, it is the most comprehensi ...

project of the

Berkeley SETI Research Center The Berkeley SETI Research Center (BSRC) conducts experiments searching for optical and electromagnetic transmissions from intelligent extraterrestrial civilizations.