telescopes

An amateur astronomer points in the direction of a celestial object under exceptionally dark skies at Cherry Springs State Park in northern Pennsylvania earlier this month.

Science

For amateur astronomers, 'star parties' are the antidote to light-polluted skies

5:00am June 24, 2023

by Scott Neuman

Each year in northern Pennsylvania, hundreds of stargazers attend gatherings under increasingly rare dark skies to look for faint galaxies, star clusters and nebulae.

An STS-125 crew member onboard the space shuttle Atlantis snaps a still photo of the Hubble Space Telescope following grapple of the giant observatory by the shuttle.

Science

The Hubble Space Telescope Still Works Great — Except When It Doesn't

1:39pm September 08, 2020

by Nell Greenfieldboyce

None of us is perfect, and sometimes the Hubble Space Telescope just flat-out points to the wrong spot in the sky. This has been happening more than ever in the last couple of years.

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One of the 54 steerable dishes that make up much of the Atacama Large Millimeter Array in Chile's Atacama Desert. This one is 39 feet in diameter.

Science

Chile And Telescopes Are A Match Made In Heaven

7:23pm August 02, 2019

by Joe Palca

The South American country is home to the Andes Mountains and the Atacama Desert, places that have some of the stillest and driest air in the world. That makes them ideal for astronomy.

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The Dunn Solar Telescope in Sunspot, N.M. The site was closed for over a week after a security threat.

After Mysterious Closure, Solar Observatory In New Mexico Reopens

5:30pm September 17, 2018

by Laurel Wamsley

A telescope in Sunspot, N.M., will have additional security for now, after "an unusual number of visitors" showed up at the site. Conspiracy theories had proliferated about its sudden closing.