STScI

A wide-field telescope

Our combined funding application to the EU LEADER Oberberg program, the Hans Hermann Voss Foundation and the Rotary Club Gummersbach for a wide-field telescope and its instrumentation (mount, camera, filter) was successful. Until now, it has been impossible to take images of large areas of the sky in our school observatory because all our telescopes image much smaller areas of the sky. Measurements of important astronomical parameters such as detailed examination and photometric age determination of stellar clusters, determination of galactic tidal effects through extreme long exposures as well as observations of galaxy clusters have so far only been possible to a limited extent. But the observation of transients such as supernovae, comets and asteroids has also been problematic. This gap will now be closed in favor of the physics core curriculum. In addition, single-shot imaging is now possible, which is otherwise only possible with the time-consuming mosaic method. This telescope, which will be installed in the upper auxiliary station under its dome, completes the observatory’s instrumentation.

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