New Chapter Begins for Kitt Peak’s 4-m Mayall
P. Marenfeld & NOAO/AURA/NSF
Its 45-year-long assignment as an “all-purpose research tool” completed, the Mayall now embarks on a new mission: creating the largest 3D map of the cosmos. The map will help chart out the role of dark energy in the expansion history of the Universe. Over the next 15 months, the telescope will prepare for the installation of the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument, a massively parallel optical spectrometer capable of measuring the spectra of 5000 astronomical objects simultaneously.
Read more in NOAO Press Release 18-02.
Kitt Peak National Observatory (KPNO), part of the National
Optical Astronomy Observatory (NOAO), supports the most diverse
collection of astronomical observatories on Earth for nighttime
optical and infrared astronomy and daytime study of the Sun. Sharing the
mountaintop site
with the National Solar Observatory, KPNO, founded in 1958, operates
three major nighttime telescopes and hosts the facilities of consortia
which operate 22 optical telescopes and two radio telescopes.
(See the Tenant Observatories list.)
Kitt Peak is located 56 miles southwest of Tucson, AZ, in the Schuk Toak
District on the Tohono O'odham Nation and has a Visitor Center open daily
to the public.
If you need to contact someone at NOAO but are uncertain of that person's email
address, simply send email to "first_inital_last_name_at_noao.edu", i.e.,
bsmith_at_noao.edu or jdoe_at_noao.edu. A general
purpose email account has been set up to answer any questions you have about
observing at Kitt Peak and don't know who to ask. Any and all questions you have can be e-mailed to this address: kpno_at_noao.edu and it will be forwarded to the appropriate person.
