Danish 1.54-metre telescope

The Danish 1.54-metre telescope was built by Grubb-Parsons, and has been in use at La Silla since 1979. It is equipped with the Danish Faint Object Spectrograph and Camera (DFOSC) spectrograph/camera that is similar in concept and in layout to ESO's EFOSC2 attached to the ESO 3.6-metre telescope.

The telescope has been a real workhorse, and allowed astronomers to make several first. In 2005, thanks to the Danish 1.54-metre telescope astronomers showed that short, intense bursts of gamma-ray emission most likely originate from the violent collision of two merging neutron stars, ending a long debate. While in 2006, astronomers using a network of telescopes scattered across the globe, including the Danish telescope, discovered an exoplanet only about 5 times as massive as the Earth, and circling its parent star in about 10 years. It was the smallest at the time and the first rocky exoplanet discovered.

Credit:

ESO/C.Madsen

About the Image

Id:esopia00052teles
Type:Photographic
Release date:3 December 2009, 23:21
Size:2459 x 3000 px

About the Object

Name:Danish 1.54-metre telescope, Danish Faint Object Spectrograph and Camera
Type:Unspecified : Technology : Observatory : Telescope
Category:La Silla

Image Formats

Large JPEG
1.8 MB
Screensize JPEG
301.1 KB

Wallpapers

1024x768
252.2 KB
1280x1024
394.2 KB
1600x1200
549.4 KB
1920x1200
623.9 KB
2048x1536
859.1 KB