The Vacuum Tower Telescope is an evacuated-optics

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 ...

located at the

Teide Observatory Teide Observatory (), IAU code 954, is an astronomical observatory on Mount Teide at , located on Tenerife, Spain. It has been operated by the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias since its inauguration in 1964. It became one of the first major ...

Tenerife Tenerife ( ; ; formerly spelled ''Teneriffe'') is the largest and most populous island of the Canary Islands, an Autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of Spain. With a land area of and a population of 965,575 inhabitants as of A ...

in the

Canary Islands The Canary Islands (; ) or Canaries are an archipelago in the Atlantic Ocean and the southernmost Autonomous communities of Spain, Autonomous Community of Spain. They are located in the northwest of Africa, with the closest point to the cont ...

. It is operated by the Kiepenheuer-Institut für Sonnenphysik (KIS).Kiepenheuer-Institut für Sonnenphysik (KIS)
/ref> It was built between 1983 and 1986, with first light in 1988. It has a

primary mirror A primary mirror (or primary) is the principal light-gathering surface (the objective) of a reflecting telescope. Description The primary mirror of a reflecting telescope is a spherical, parabolic, or hyperbolic shaped disks of polished ...

and a

focal length The focal length of an Optics, optical system is a measure of how strongly the system converges or diverges light; it is the Multiplicative inverse, inverse of the system's optical power. A positive focal length indicates that a system Converge ...

of . Thanks to an

adaptive optics Adaptive optics (AO) is a technique of precisely deforming a mirror in order to compensate for light distortion. It is used in Astronomy, astronomical telescopes and laser communication systems to remove the effects of Astronomical seeing, atmo ...

system ''KAOS'' (''K''iepenheuer-institute ''A''daptive ''O''ptic ''S''ystem), in operation since spring 2000, it is able to resolve details down to 0.2 arc seconds (150 km) on 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 surface.

Description

The VTT and the GREGOR are operated by four German institutes: the

Astrophysikalisches Institut Potsdam Leibniz Institute for Astrophysics Potsdam (AIP) is a German research institute. It is the successor of the Berlin Observatory founded in 1700 and of the Astrophysical Observatory Potsdam (AOP) founded in 1874. The latter was the world's first ...

, the Kiepenheuer-Institut für Sonnenphysik (Freiburg, chair), the Max-Planck-Institut für Sonnensystemforschung (Lindau), and the Universitäts-Sternwarte Göttingen. The telescope is used for scientific observations from mid-April through mid-December. Typically 30 to 40 observing campaigns are carried out every year.

History

In the early seventies, the 40-centimetre Newton telescope, built at the Kiepenheuer-Institut, was installed at the

Observatorio del Teide Observatorio may refer to: * Observatorio metro station (Mexico City), Mexico * Observatorio metro station (Santiago), Chile * Observatorio railway station ''El Insurgente'' () is a commuter rail line between the State of Mexico and Mexico C ...

. In 1982, the Federal Republic of Germany joined the international Agreement on the Cooperation in Astrophysical Research between Spain, Great Britain, Sweden and Denmark. Construction work for the German solar telescopes started in 1983, including the Vacuum Tower Telescope (VTT), and the Gregory-Coudé-Telescope (GCT) of the Universitäts-Sternwarte Göttingen. The VTT was developed at the Kiepenheuer-Institut in

Freiburg Freiburg im Breisgau or simply Freiburg is the List of cities in Baden-Württemberg by population, fourth-largest city of the German state of Baden-Württemberg after Stuttgart, Mannheim and Karlsruhe. Its built-up area has a population of abou ...

during the mid-seventies. The telescope was installed in 1986 and the scientific operations started in 1988. Since then, the VTT has been constantly improved and has been the workhorse for our researchers. The GCT was put into operation in 1985 and dismantled in 2002, in order to make room for the new 1.5-metre

GREGOR Gregor is a masculine given name. Notable people and fictional characters with the name include: * Gregor (musician) (1898–1971), Armenian bandleader * Gregor Abel (born 1949), Scottish footballer * Gregor Adlercreutz (1898–1944), Swedish eq ...

telescope.

Results

The VTT instrumentation is designed for high-quality measurements of plasma flows and magnetic fields. Some instruments can be combined for simultaneous observations in different parts of the solar spectrum, from the

near-infrared Infrared (IR; sometimes called infrared light) is electromagnetic radiation (EMR) with wavelengths longer than that of visible light but shorter than microwaves. The infrared spectral band begins with the waves that are just longer than those of ...

to the near-UV. This possibility is a unique feature for a solar telescope and allows it to reveal the three-dimensional structure of the

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

. With the help of adaptive optics and suitable image-reconstruction techniques, it is now possible to observe physical properties of small-scale objects on the solar surface with sizes of only 150 km, at the theoretical limit of the telescope.

References

External links

German Solar Telescopes
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* {{APOD , date=22 May 2007 , title=Orange Sun Oozing
Telescope Information: Vacuum Tower Telescope
Telescopes Solar telescopes

Description

History

Results

See also

References

External links