The Faulkes Telescope South is a clone of the
Liverpool Telescope
The Liverpool Telescope (LT) is a two-metre-aperture robotic Ritchey–Chrétien telescope that observes autonomously (without human intervention). However professional astronomers, school groups and other credible registered users submit specif ...
and is located at
Siding Spring Observatory
Siding Spring Observatory near Coonabarabran, New South Wales, Australia, part of the Research School of Astronomy & Astrophysics (RSAA) at the Australian National University (ANU), incorporates the Anglo-Australian Telescope along with a coll ...
in New South Wales, Australia. It is a
Ritchey-Chrétien telescope. It was designed to be
operated remotely with the aim of encouraging an interest in science by young people.
It is supported by an
altazimuth mount
An altazimuth mount or alt-azimuth mount is a simple two- axis mount for supporting and rotating an instrument about two perpendicular axes – one vertical and the other horizontal. Rotation about the vertical axis varies the azimuth (compass b ...
.
The telescope is owned and operated by
LCOGT.
This telescope and its sister telescope
Faulkes Telescope North are used by research and education groups across the globe. The
Faulkes Telescope Project
The Faulkes Telescope Project (FTP) is supported by the Dill Faulkes Educational Trust. It provides access to 1,500 hours of observing time on two 2-metre class telescopes located in Hawaii ( Faulkes Telescope North in Hawaii) and Australia ( Fa ...
is one such group which provides observing time (awarded by LCOGT) for educational projects for UK schools. Funds were initially sourced by charitable donations from philanthropist
Dr. Martin C. Faulkes.
Faulkes Telescope South saw first light in 2004 with full operations occurring by 2006.
Discoveries
2008 HJ is a small near-Earth asteroid which at the time of its discovery was the most rapidly rotating object in the solar system.
Observations
On the 4 May 2007 the first ever observation of one of the satellites of
Uranus
Uranus is the seventh planet from the Sun. It is a gaseous cyan-coloured ice giant. Most of the planet is made of water, ammonia, and methane in a Supercritical fluid, supercritical phase of matter, which astronomy calls "ice" or Volatile ( ...
passing in front of another was made by Marton Hidas and Tim Brown.
In 2013 it was used to image the Near-Earth asteroid
2013 XY8.
[Asteroid 2013 XY8 Tumbled By Earth Today - Slate]
/ref>
See also
*List of largest optical reflecting telescopes
This list of the largest optical reflecting telescopes with Objective (optics), objective diameters of or greater is sorted by aperture, which is a measure of the light-gathering power and resolution of a reflecting telescope. The mirrors themse ...
*Liverpool Telescope
The Liverpool Telescope (LT) is a two-metre-aperture robotic Ritchey–Chrétien telescope that observes autonomously (without human intervention). However professional astronomers, school groups and other credible registered users submit specif ...
*List of telescopes of Australia
The list below is split between telescopes located in Australia, and telescopes sponsored by Australia such as a space telescope or foreign installation.
Australia can access the Southern skies, which was a popular trend in the 20th century (ma ...
References
External links
Faulkes Telescope website
The RoboNet
global network which controls the Faulkes Telescopes over the internet
{{Portal bar, Australia, Astronomy, Stars, Spaceflight, Outer space, Solar System, Education, Science
Robotic telescopes
Siding Spring Observatory
2004 establishments in Australia