The Center for Astrophysics , Harvard & Smithsonian (CfA), previously known as the Harvard–Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, is an

astrophysics Astrophysics is a science that employs the methods and principles of physics and chemistry in the study of astronomical objects and phenomena. As one of the founders of the discipline, James Keeler, said, astrophysics "seeks to ascertain the ...

research institute A research institute, research centre, or research organization is an establishment founded for doing research. Research institutes may specialize in basic research or may be oriented to applied research. Although the term often implies natural ...

jointly operated by the

Harvard College Observatory The Harvard College Observatory (HCO) is an institution managing a complex of buildings and multiple instruments used for astronomical research by the Harvard University Department of Astronomy. It is located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United St ...

and

Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO) is a research institute of the Smithsonian Institution, concentrating on Astrophysics, astrophysical studies including Galactic astronomy, galactic and extragalactic astronomy, cosmology, Sun, solar ...

. Founded in 1973 and headquartered in

Cambridge, Massachusetts Cambridge ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. It is a suburb in the Greater Boston metropolitan area, located directly across the Charles River from Boston. The city's population as of the 2020 United States census, ...

, United States, the CfA leads a broad program of research in

astronomy Astronomy is a natural science that studies celestial objects and the phenomena that occur in the cosmos. It uses mathematics, physics, and chemistry in order to explain their origin and their overall evolution. Objects of interest includ ...

Earth Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to Planetary habitability, harbor life. This is enabled by Earth being an ocean world, the only one in the Solar System sustaining liquid surface water. Almost all ...

and

space science Space is a three-dimensional continuum containing positions and directions. In classical physics, physical space is often conceived in three linear dimensions. Modern physicists usually consider it, with time, to be part of a boundless ...

s, as well as

science education Science education is the teaching and learning of science to school children, college students, or adults within the general public. The field of science education includes work in science content, science process (the scientific method), some ...

. The CfA either leads or participates in the development and operations of more than fifteen ground- and space-based astronomical research

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

across the

electromagnetic spectrum The electromagnetic spectrum is the full range of electromagnetic radiation, organized by frequency or wavelength. The spectrum is divided into separate bands, with different names for the electromagnetic waves within each band. From low to high ...

, including the forthcoming Giant Magellan Telescope (GMT) and the

Chandra X-ray Observatory The Chandra X-ray Observatory (CXO), previously known as the Advanced X-ray Astrophysics Facility (AXAF), is a Flagship-class space telescope launched aboard the during STS-93 by NASA on July 23, 1999. Chandra is sensitive to X-ray sources ...

, one of

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the federal government of the United States, US federal government responsible for the United States ...

Great Observatories NASA's series of Great Observatories satellites are four large, powerful space telescope, space-based astronomical telescopes launched between 1990 and 2003. They were built with different technology to examine specific wavelength/energy region ...

. Hosting more than 850 scientists, engineers, and support staff, the CfA is among the largest astronomical research institutes in the world. Its projects have included Nobel Prize-winning advances in

cosmology Cosmology () is a branch of physics and metaphysics dealing with the nature of the universe, the cosmos. The term ''cosmology'' was first used in English in 1656 in Thomas Blount's ''Glossographia'', with the meaning of "a speaking of the wo ...

and high energy astrophysics, the discovery of many

exoplanet An exoplanet or extrasolar planet is a planet outside the Solar System. The first confirmed detection of an exoplanet was in 1992 around a pulsar, and the first detection around a main-sequence star was in 1995. A different planet, first det ...

s, and the first image of a black hole. The CfA also serves a major role in the global astrophysics research community: the CfA's

Astrophysics Data System The SAO/NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS) is a digital library portal for researchers on astronomy and physics, operated for NASA by the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory. ADS maintains three bibliographic collections containing over 15 ...

(ADS), for example, has been universally adopted as the world's

online database In computing, a database is an organized collection of Data (computing), data or a type of data store based on the use of a database management system (DBMS), the software that interacts with end users, Application software, applications, and ...

of astronomy and physics papers. Known for most of its history as the "Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics", the CfA

rebranded Rebranding is a marketing strategy in which a new name, term, symbol, design, concept or combination thereof is created for an established brand with the intention of developing a new, differentiated identity in the minds of consumers, investors ...

in 2018 to its current name in an effort to reflect its unique status as a joint collaboration between

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

and the

Smithsonian Institution The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums, Education center, education and Research institute, research centers, created by the Federal government of the United States, U.S. government "for the increase a ...

. Lisa Kewley has served as the director of the CfA since 2022.

History of the CfA

The Center for Astrophysics , Harvard & Smithsonian is not formally an independent legal organization, but rather an institutional entity operated under a memorandum of understanding between

and the

. This collaboration was formalized on July 1, 1973, with the goal of coordinating the related research activities of the

(HCO) and the

(SAO) under the leadership of a single director, and housed within the same complex of buildings on the Harvard campus in

. The CfA's history is therefore also that of the two fully independent organizations that comprise it. With a combined history of more than 300 years, HCO and SAO have been host to major milestones in astronomical history that predate the CfA's founding. These are briefly summarized below.

History of the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO)

Samuel Pierpont Langley Samuel Pierpont Langley (August 22, 1834 – February 27, 1906) was an American aviation pioneer, astronomer and physicist who invented the bolometer. He was the third secretary of the Smithsonian Institution and a professor of astronomy a ...

, the third Secretary of the Smithsonian, founded the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory on the south yard of the Smithsonian Castle (on the U.S.

National Mall The National Mall is a Landscape architecture, landscaped park near the Downtown, Washington, D.C., downtown area of Washington, D.C., the capital city of the United States. It contains and borders a number of museums of the Smithsonian Institu ...

) on March 1, 1890. The Astrophysical Observatory's initial, primary purpose was to "record the amount and character of the Sun's heat".

Charles Greeley Abbot Charles Greeley Abbot (May 31, 1872 – December 17, 1973) was an American astrophysicist and the fifth secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, serving from 1928 until 1944. Abbot went from being director of the Smithsonian Astrophysical Obse ...

was named SAO's first director, and the observatory operated

solar telescope A solar telescope or a solar observatory is a special-purpose telescope used to observe the Sun. Solar telescopes usually detect light with wavelengths in, or not far outside, the visible spectrum. Obsolete names for Sun telescopes include helio ...

s to take daily measurements of the

Sun The Sun is the star at the centre of the Solar System. It is a massive, nearly perfect sphere of hot plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core, radiating the energy from its surface mainly as visible light a ...

's intensity in different regions of the optical electromagnetic spectrum. In doing so, the observatory enabled Abbot to make critical refinements to the

Solar constant The solar constant (''GSC'') measures the amount of energy received by a given area one astronomical unit away from the Sun. More specifically, it is a flux density measuring mean solar electromagnetic radiation ( total solar irradiance) per un ...

, as well as to serendipitously discover Solar variability. It is likely that SAO's early history as a solar observatory was part of the inspiration behind the Smithsonian's "sunburst" logo, designed in 1965 by Crimilda Pontes. In 1955, the scientific headquarters of SAO moved from Washington, D.C. to

, to affiliate with the

(HCO). Fred Lawrence Whipple, then the chairman of the Harvard Astronomy Department, was named the new director of SAO. The collaborative relationship between SAO and HCO therefore predates the official creation of the CfA by 18 years. SAO's move to Harvard's campus also resulted in a rapid expansion of its research program. Following the launch of

Sputnik Sputnik 1 (, , ''Satellite 1''), sometimes referred to as simply Sputnik, was the first artificial Earth satellite. It was launched into an elliptical low Earth orbit by the Soviet Union on 4 October 1957 as part of the Soviet space progra ...

(the world's first human-made satellite) in 1957, SAO accepted a national challenge to create a worldwide satellite-tracking network, collaborating with the

United States Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the Air force, air service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is one of the six United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Tracing its ori ...

Project Space Track Project Space Track was a research and development project of the US Air Force, to create a tracking system for all artificial satellites of the Earth and space probes, domestic and foreign. Project Space Track was started in 1957 at the Air For ...

. With the creation of

the following year and throughout the

Space Race The Space Race (, ) was a 20th-century competition between the Cold War rivals, the United States and the Soviet Union, to achieve superior spaceflight capability. It had its origins in the ballistic missile-based nuclear arms race between t ...

, SAO led major efforts in the development of orbiting observatories and large ground-based telescopes, laboratory and theoretical astrophysics, as well as the application of computers to astrophysical problems.

History of Harvard College Observatory (HCO)

Partly in response to renewed public interest in astronomy following the 1835 return of

Halley's Comet Halley's Comet is the only known List of periodic comets, short-period comet that is consistently visible to the naked eye from Earth, appearing every 72–80 years, though with the majority of recorded apparitions (25 of 30) occurring after ...

, the Harvard College Observatory was founded in 1839, when the

Harvard Corporation The President and Fellows of Harvard College, also called the Harvard Corporation or just the Corporation, is the smaller and more powerful of Harvard University's two governing boards. It refers to itself as the oldest corporation in the Western ...

appointed William Cranch Bond as an "Astronomical Observer to the University". For its first four years of operation, the observatory was situated at the Dana-Palmer House (where Bond also resided) near

Harvard Yard Harvard Yard is the oldest and among the most prominent parts of the campus of Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The yard has a historic center and modern crossroads and contains List of Harvard College freshman dormitories, most ...

, and consisted of little more than three small telescopes and an astronomical clock. In his 1840 book recounting the history of the college, then Harvard President

Josiah Quincy III Josiah Quincy III (; February 4, 1772 – July 1, 1864) was an American educator and political figure. He was a member of the U.S. House of Representatives (1805–1813), mayor of Boston (1823–1828), and President of Harvard University (182 ...

noted that "there is wanted a reflecting telescope equatorially mounted". This telescope, the 15-inch "Great Refractor", opened seven years later (in 1847) at the top of Observatory Hill in

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a List of cities in the United Kingdom, city and non-metropolitan district in the county of Cambridgeshire, England. It is the county town of Cambridgeshire and is located on the River Cam, north of London. As of the 2021 Unit ...

(where it still exists today, housed in the oldest of the CfA's complex of buildings). The telescope was the largest in the United States from 1847 until 1867. William Bond and pioneer photographer John Adams Whipple used the Great Refractor to produce the first clear Daguerrotypes of the

Moon The Moon is Earth's only natural satellite. It Orbit of the Moon, orbits around Earth at Lunar distance, an average distance of (; about 30 times Earth diameter, Earth's diameter). The Moon rotation, rotates, with a rotation period (lunar ...

(winning them an award at the 1851

Great Exhibition The Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations, also known as the Great Exhibition or the Crystal Palace Exhibition (in reference to the temporary structure in which it was held), was an international exhibition that took ...

in London). Bond and his son, George Phillips Bond (the second director of HCO), used it to discover Saturn's 8th moon, Hyperion (which was also independently discovered by

William Lassell William Lassell (18 June 1799 – 5 October 1880) was an English merchant and astronomer.Edward Charles Pickering from 1877 to 1919, the observatory became the world's major producer of stellar spectra and magnitudes, established an observing station in

Peru Peru, officially the Republic of Peru, is a country in western South America. It is bordered in the north by Ecuador and Colombia, in the east by Brazil, in the southeast by Bolivia, in the south by Chile, and in the south and west by the Pac ...

, and applied mass-production methods to the analysis of data. It was during this time that HCO became host to a series of major discoveries in astronomical history, powered by the observatory's so-called "

Computers A computer is a machine that can be programmed to automatically carry out sequences of arithmetic or logical operations ('' computation''). Modern digital electronic computers can perform generic sets of operations known as ''programs'', ...

" (women hired by Pickering as skilled workers to process astronomical data). These "Computers" included

Williamina Fleming Williamina Paton Stevens Fleming (15 May 1857 – 21 May 1911) was a pioneering Scottish astronomer, who made significant contributions to the field despite facing gender biases. She was a single mother hired by the director of the Harvard Co ...

Annie Jump Cannon Annie Jump Cannon (; December 11, 1863 – April 13, 1941) was an American astronomer whose cataloging work was instrumental in the development of contemporary stellar classification. With Edward C. Pickering, she is credited with the creation of ...

Henrietta Swan Leavitt Henrietta Swan Leavitt (; July 4, 1868 – December 12, 1921) was an American astronomer. Her discovery of how to effectively measure vast distances to remote galaxies led to a shift in the understanding of the scale and nature of the universe. ...

, Florence Cushman and Antonia Maury, all widely recognized today as major figures in scientific history.

, for example, discovered the so-called period-luminosity relation for Classical Cepheid variable

star A star is a luminous spheroid of plasma (physics), plasma held together by Self-gravitation, self-gravity. The List of nearest stars and brown dwarfs, nearest star to Earth is the Sun. Many other stars are visible to the naked eye at night sk ...

s, establishing the first major "

standard candle The cosmic distance ladder (also known as the extragalactic distance scale) is the succession of methods by which astronomers determine the distances to celestial objects. A ''direct'' distance measurement of an astronomical object is possible ...

" with which to measure the distance to

galaxies A galaxy is a system of stars, stellar remnants, interstellar gas, dust, and dark matter bound together by gravity. The word is derived from the Greek ' (), literally 'milky', a reference to the Milky Way galaxy that contains the Solar Sys ...

. Now called " Leavitt's law", the discovery is regarded as one of the most foundational and important in the

history of astronomy The history of astronomy focuses on the contributions civilizations have made to further their understanding of the universe beyond earth's atmosphere. Astronomy is one of the oldest natural sciences, achieving a high level of success in the sec ...

; astronomers like

Edwin Hubble Edwin Powell Hubble (November 20, 1889 – September 28, 1953) was an American astronomer. He played a crucial role in establishing the fields of extragalactic astronomy and observational cosmology. Hubble proved that many objects previously ...

, for example, would later use Leavitt's law to establish that the Universe is expanding, the primary piece of evidence for the Big Bang model. Upon Pickering's retirement in 1921, the directorship of HCO fell to

Harlow Shapley Harlow Shapley (November 2, 1885 – October 20, 1972) was an American astronomer, who served as head of the Harvard College Observatory from 1921–1952, and political activist during the latter New Deal and Fair Deal. Shapley used Cepheid var ...

(a major participant in the so-called " Great Debate" of 1920). This era of the observatory was made famous by the work of Cecelia Payne-Gaposchkin, who became the first woman to earn a PhD in astronomy from

Radcliffe College Radcliffe College was a Women's colleges in the United States, women's Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Cambridge, Massachusetts, that was founded in 1879. In 1999, it was fully incorporated into Harvard Colle ...

(a short walk from the observatory). Payne-Gapochkin's 1925 thesis proposed that

stars A star is a luminous spheroid of plasma held together by self-gravity. The nearest star to Earth is the Sun. Many other stars are visible to the naked eye at night; their immense distances from Earth make them appear as fixed points of ...

were composed primarily of

hydrogen Hydrogen is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol H and atomic number 1. It is the lightest and abundance of the chemical elements, most abundant chemical element in the universe, constituting about 75% of all baryon, normal matter ...

and

helium Helium (from ) is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol He and atomic number 2. It is a colorless, odorless, non-toxic, inert gas, inert, monatomic gas and the first in the noble gas group in the periodic table. Its boiling point is ...

, an idea thought ridiculous at the time. Between Shapley's tenure and the formation of the CfA, the observatory was directed by Donald H. Menzel and then Leo Goldberg, both of whom maintained widely recognized programs in solar and stellar astrophysics. Menzel played a major role in encouraging the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory to move to Cambridge and collaborate more closely with HCO.

Joint history as the Center for Astrophysics (CfA)

The collaborative foundation for what would ultimately give rise to the Center for Astrophysics began with SAO's move to Cambridge in 1955.

Fred Whipple Fred Lawrence Whipple (November 5, 1906 – August 30, 2004) was an American astronomer, who worked at the Harvard College Observatory for more than 70 years. Among his achievements were asteroid and comet discoveries, the " dirty snowball" hy ...

, who was already chair of the Harvard Astronomy Department (housed within HCO since 1931), was named SAO's new director at the start of this new era; an early test of the model for a unified directorship across HCO and SAO. The following 18 years would see the two independent entities merge ever closer together, operating effectively (but informally) as one large research center. This joint relationship was formalized as the new Harvard–Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics on July 1, 1973. George B. Field, then affiliated with Berkeley, was appointed as its first director. That same year, a new astronomical

journal A journal, from the Old French ''journal'' (meaning "daily"), may refer to: *Bullet journal, a method of personal organization *Diary, a record of personal secretive thoughts and as open book to personal therapy or used to feel connected to onesel ...

, the ''CfA Preprint Series'' was created, and a CfA/SAO instrument flying aboard

Skylab Skylab was the United States' first space station, launched by NASA, occupied for about 24 weeks between May 1973 and February 1974. It was operated by three trios of astronaut crews: Skylab 2, Skylab 3, and Skylab 4. Skylab was constructe ...

discovered

coronal hole Coronal holes are regions of the Sun's corona that emit low levels of ultraviolet and X-ray radiation compared to their surroundings. They are composed of relatively cool and tenuous plasma (physics), plasma permeated by magnetic fields that are o ...

s on the Sun. The founding of the CfA also coincided with the birth of

X-ray astronomy X-ray astronomy is an observational branch of astronomy which deals with the study of X-ray observation and detection from astronomical objects. X-radiation is absorbed by the Earth's atmosphere, so instruments to detect X-rays must be taken to ...

as a new, major field that was largely dominated by CfA scientists in its early years.

Riccardo Giacconi Riccardo Giacconi ( , ; October 6, 1931 – December 9, 2018) was an Italian-American Nobel Prize-winning astrophysicist who laid down the foundations of X-ray astronomy. He was a professor at the Johns Hopkins University. Biography Born in ...

, regarded as the "father of X-ray astronomy", founded the High Energy Astrophysics Division within the new CfA by moving most of his research group (then at American Sciences and Engineering) to SAO in 1973. That group would later go on to launch the Einstein Observatory (the first imaging

X-ray telescope An X-ray telescope (XRT) is a telescope that is designed to observe remote objects in the X-ray spectrum. X-rays are absorbed by the Earth's atmosphere, so instruments to detect X-rays must be taken to high altitude by balloons, sounding rockets ...

) in 1976, and ultimately lead the proposals and development of what would become the

. Chandra, the second of NASA's Great Observatories and still the most powerful X-ray telescope in history, continues operations today as part of the CfA's Chandra X-ray Center. Giacconi would later win the 2002 Nobel Prize in Physics for his foundational work in X-ray astronomy. Shortly after the launch of the Einstein Observatory, the CfA's

Steven Weinberg Steven Weinberg (; May 3, 1933 – July 23, 2021) was an American theoretical physicist and Nobel laureate in physics for his contributions with Abdus Salam and Sheldon Glashow to the unification of the weak force and electromagnetic inter ...

won the 1979 Nobel Prize in Physics for his work on electroweak unification. The following decade saw the start of the landmark

CfA Redshift Survey The Center for Astrophysics (CfA) Redshift Survey was the first attempt to map the large-scale structure of the universe. The first survey began in 1977 with the objective of calculating the velocities of the brighter galaxies in the nearby univ ...

(the first attempt to map the large scale structure of the Universe), as well as the release of the "Field Report", a highly influential Astronomy and Astrophysics Decadal Survey chaired by the outgoing CfA Director George Field. He would be replaced in 1982 by Irwin Shapiro, who during his tenure as director (1982 to 2004) oversaw the expansion of the CfA's observing facilities around the world, including the newly named

Fred Lawrence Whipple Observatory The Fred Lawrence Whipple Observatory is an American astronomical observatory owned and operated by the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO); it is their largest field installation outside of their main site in Cambridge, Massachusetts. ...

, the

Infrared Telescope An infrared telescope is a telescope that uses infrared light to detect celestial bodies. Infrared light is one of several types of radiation present in the electromagnetic spectrum. All celestial objects with a temperature above absolute zero ...

(IRT) aboard the

Space Shuttle The Space Shuttle is a retired, partially reusable launch system, reusable low Earth orbital spacecraft system operated from 1981 to 2011 by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) as part of the Space Shuttle program. ...

, the 6.5-meter Multiple Mirror Telescope (MMT), the SOHO satellite, and the launch of

Chandra Chandra (), also known as Soma (), is the Hindu god of the Moon, and is associated with the night, plants and vegetation. He is one of the Navagraha (nine planets of Hinduism) and Dikpala (guardians of the directions). Etymology and other ...

in 1999. CfA-led discoveries throughout this period include canonical work on Supernova 1987A, the " CfA2 Great Wall" (then the largest known coherent structure in the Universe), the best-yet evidence for

supermassive black hole A supermassive black hole (SMBH or sometimes SBH) is the largest type of black hole, with its mass being on the order of hundreds of thousands, or millions to billions, of times the mass of the Sun (). Black holes are a class of astronomical ...

s, and the first convincing evidence for an

extrasolar planet An exoplanet or extrasolar planet is a planet outside the Solar System. The first confirmed detection of an exoplanet was in 1992 around a pulsar, and the first detection around a main-sequence star was in 1995. A different planet, first detect ...

. The 1980s also saw the CfA play a distinct role in the history of

computer science Computer science is the study of computation, information, and automation. Computer science spans Theoretical computer science, theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, and information theory) to Applied science, ...

and the internet: in 1986, SAO started developing SAOImage, one of the world's first X11-based applications made publicly available (its successor, DS9, remains the most widely used astronomical

FITS Flexible Image Transport System (FITS) is an open standard defining a digital file format used for storage, transmission and processing of data: formatted as multi-dimensional arrays (for example a 2D image), or tables. FITS is the most commonl ...

image viewer worldwide). During this time, scientists and software developers at the CfA also began work on what would become the

(ADS), one of the world's first online databases of research papers. By 1993, the ADS was running the first routine transatlantic queries between databases, a foundational aspect of the internet today.

The CfA today

Research at the CfA

Charles Alcock, known for a number of major works related to

massive compact halo object A MAssive Compact Halo Object (MACHO) is a kind of astronomy, astronomical body that might explain the apparent presence of dark matter in galactic halos. A MACHO is a body that emits little or no radiation and drifts through interstellar space un ...

s, was named the third director of the CfA in 2004. Today Alcock oversees one of the largest and most productive astronomical institutes in the world, with more than 850 staff and an annual budget in excess of $100 million. The Harvard Department of Astronomy, housed within the CfA, maintains a continual complement of approximately 60 PhD students, more than 100

postdoctoral researcher A postdoctoral fellow, postdoctoral researcher, or simply postdoc, is a person professionally conducting research after the completion of their doctoral studies (typically a PhD). Postdocs most commonly, but not always, have a temporary acade ...

s, and roughly 25

undergraduate Undergraduate education is education conducted after secondary education and before postgraduate education, usually in a college or university. It typically includes all postsecondary programs up to the level of a bachelor's degree. For example, ...

astronomy and astrophysics majors from

Harvard College Harvard College is the undergraduate education, undergraduate college of Harvard University, a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Part of the Harvard Faculty of Arts and Scienc ...

. SAO, meanwhile, hosts a long-running and highly rated REU Summer Intern program as well as many visiting graduate students. The CfA estimates that roughly 10% of the professional astrophysics community in the United States spent at least a portion of their career or education there. The CfA is either a lead or major partner in the operations of the

, the

Submillimeter Array The Submillimeter Array (SMA) consists of eight diameter radio telescopes arranged as an interferometer for submillimetre astronomy, submillimeter wavelength observations. It is the first purpose-built submillimeter interferometer, constructed a ...

, MMT Observatory, the South Pole Telescope,

VERITAS In Roman mythology, Veritas (), meaning Truth, is the Goddess of Truth, a daughter of Saturn (mythology), Saturn (called Cronus by the Greeks, the Titan (mythology), Titan of Time, perhaps first by Plutarch) and the mother of Virtus (deity), Vi ...

, and a number of other smaller ground-based telescopes. The CfA's 2019–2024 Strategic Plan includes the construction of the Giant Magellan Telescope as a driving priority for the center. Along with the

, the CfA plays a central role in a number of space-based observing facilities, including the recently launched

Parker Solar Probe The Parker Solar Probe (PSP; previously Solar Probe, Solar Probe Plus or Solar Probe+) is a NASA space probe launched in 2018 to make observations of the Stellar corona, Sun's outer corona. It used repeated Gravity assist, gravity assists from ...

Kepler space telescope The Kepler space telescope is a defunct space telescope launched by NASA in 2009 to discover Earth-sized planets orbiting other stars. Named after astronomer Johannes Kepler, the spacecraft was launched into an Earth-trailing heliocentric orb ...

, the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO), and Hinode. The CfA, via the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, recently played a major role in the Lynx X-ray Observatory, a NASA-funded large mission concept study commissioned as part of the 2020 Astronomy and Astrophysics Decadal Survey ("Astro2020"). If launched,

Lynx A lynx ( ; : lynx or lynxes) is any of the four wikt:extant, extant species (the Canada lynx, Iberian lynx, Eurasian lynx and the bobcat) within the medium-sized wild Felidae, cat genus ''Lynx''. The name originated in Middle Engl ...

would be the most powerful X-ray observatory constructed to date, enabling order-of-magnitude advances in capability over Chandra. SAO is one of the 13 stakeholder institutes for the

Event Horizon Telescope The Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) is a Astronomical interferometer, telescope array consisting of a global network of radio telescopes. The EHT project combines data from several very-long-baseline interferometry (VLBI) stations around Earth, wh ...

Board, and the CfA hosts its Array Operations Center. In 2019, the project revealed the first direct image of a black hole. The result is widely regarded as a triumph not only of

observational astronomy Observational astronomy is a division of astronomy that is concerned with recording data about the observable universe, in contrast with theoretical astronomy, which is mainly concerned with calculating the measurable implications of physical ...

, but of its intersection with theoretical astrophysics. Union of the observational and theoretical subfields of astrophysics has been a major focus of the CfA since its founding. In 2018, the CfA

, changing its official name to the "Center for Astrophysics , Harvard & Smithsonian" in an effort to reflect its unique status as a joint collaboration between

and the

. Today, the CfA receives roughly 70% of its funding from

, 22% from Smithsonian federal funds, and 4% from the

National Science Foundation The U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) is an Independent agencies of the United States government#Examples of independent agencies, independent agency of the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government that su ...

. The remaining 4% comes from contributors including the

United States Department of Energy The United States Department of Energy (DOE) is an executive department of the U.S. federal government that oversees U.S. national energy policy and energy production, the research and development of nuclear power, the military's nuclear w ...

, the

Annenberg Foundation The Annenberg Foundation is a foundation that provides funding and support to non-profit organizations. Overview The Annenberg Foundation was established by Walter H. Annenberg in 1989 with $1.2 billion, one-third of the assets from the sale o ...

, as well as other gifts and endowments.

Organizational structure

Research across the CfA is organized into six divisions and seven research centers:

Scientific divisions within the CfA

* Atomic and Molecular Physics (AMP) * High Energy Astrophysics (HEA) * Optical and Infrared Astronomy (OIR) * Radio and Geoastronomy (RG) * Solar, Stellar, and Planetary Sciences (SSP) * Theoretical Astrophysics (TA)

Centers hosted at the CfA

* Chandra X-ray Center (CXC), the science operations center for

* Institute for Theory and Computation (ITC) * Institute for Theoretical Atomic, Molecular, and Optical Physics (ITAMP) * Center for Parallel Astrophysical Computing (CPAC) *

Minor Planet Center The Minor Planet Center (MPC) is the official body for observing and reporting on minor planets under the auspices of the International Astronomical Union (IAU). Founded in 1947, it operates at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory. Funct ...

(MPC) * Telescope Data Center (TDC) * Radio Telescope Data Center (RTDC) * Solar & Stellar X-ray Group (SSXG) The CfA is also host to the Harvard University Department of Astronomy, large central engineering and computation facilities, the Science Education Department, the John G. Wolbach Library, the world's largest database of astronomy and physics papers (ADS), and the world's largest collection of astronomical photographic plates.

Observatories operated with CfA participation

Ground-based observatories

* Magellan telescopes * MMT Observatory *

* South Pole Telescope *

* 1.2-Meter Millimeter-Wave Telescope * Very Energetic Radiation Imaging Telescope Array System (VERITAS)

Space-based observatories and probes

Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) is a space telescope for NASA's Explorer program, designed to search for exoplanets using the transit method in an area 400 times larger than that covered by the Kepler mission. It was launched on ...

(TESS) *

* Hinode *

Kepler Johannes Kepler (27 December 1571 – 15 November 1630) was a German astronomer, mathematician, astrologer, natural philosopher and writer on music. He is a key figure in the 17th-century Scientific Revolution, best known for his laws of p ...

* Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) * Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) *

Spitzer Space Telescope The Spitzer Space Telescope, formerly the Space Infrared Telescope Facility (SIRTF), was an infrared space telescope launched in 2003, that was deactivated when operations ended on 30 January 2020. Spitzer was the third space telescope dedicate ...

Planned future observatories

* Lynx X-ray Observatory * Giant Magellan Telescope * Murchison Widefield Array * Square Kilometer Array *

Pan-STARRS The Panoramic Survey Telescope and Rapid Response System (Pan-STARRS1; List of observatory codes, obs. code: IAU code#F51, F51 and Pan-STARRS2 obs. code: IAU code#F52, F52) located at Haleakala Observatory, Hawaii, US, consists of astronomical ...

* Vera C. Rubin Observatory (formerly called the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope)

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics 01 Astronomical observatories in Massachusetts Astronomy institutes and departments Astrophysics research institutes Harvard University research institutes Smithsonian Institution research programs Research institutes established in 1973 1973 establishments in Massachusetts Harvard University buildings

History of the CfA

History of the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO)

History of Harvard College Observatory (HCO)

Joint history as the Center for Astrophysics (CfA)

The CfA today

Research at the CfA

Organizational structure

Scientific divisions within the CfA

Centers hosted at the CfA

Observatories operated with CfA participation

Ground-based observatories

Space-based observatories and probes

Planned future observatories

See also

References

External links