Press Releases: Kitt Peak National Observatory

14 Septiembre 2006: Kitt Peak National Observatory boasts the greatest number of research telescopes on one mountain anywhere in the world. In addition to the twenty-five optical and two radio telescopes, Kitt Peak also offers an attractive visitor center complete with exhibits, and a gift shop, daily telescope tours, and world-renowned nightly public observing programs by reservation. However, until now, there was no shuttle transportation available for those people who would prefer not driving up the winding mountain road to the observatory.

25 Enero 2006: The American Astronomical Society (AAS) has awarded its 2006 Education Prize to Dr. Sidney Wolff, an astronomer and former director of the National Optical Astronomy Observatory in Tucson, Arizona.

11 Enero 2006: An artist’s rendition shows a planet orbiting a very young, active star pocked with dark star spots and speckled with flares and other surface activity.

10 Enero 2006: Strong darkening observed around the equator of Vega suggests that the fifth brightest star in Earth’s sky has a huge temperature difference of 4,000 degrees Fahrenheit from its cool equatorial region to its hot poles.

6 Diciembre 2005: More than half of the largest galaxies in the nearby universe have collided and merged with another galaxy in the past two billion years, according to a new study using hundreds of images from two of the deepest sky surveys ever conducted.

4 Noviembre 2005: A growing slate of public programs and related outreach activities has spurred the Visitor Center at Kitt Peak National Observatory to offer its first-ever membership program for the general public.

30 Agosto 2005: A comprehensive survey of more than 4,000 elliptical and lenticular galaxies in 93 nearby galaxy clusters has found a curious case of galactic “downsizing.”

8 Julio 2005: High school teachers making observations with the research telescopes at Kitt Peak National Observatory as part of an intensive professional development workshop obtained some of the earliest multicolor imaging and spectra of a newly exploded massive star in a nearby galaxy.

30 Junio 2005: How can you watch the planned first-of-its-kind collision between a comet and a spacecraft from Earth this weekend, even if your night skies don’t allow a direct view?

23 Junio 2005: All of the major telescopes of the National Optical Astronomy Observatory (NOAO) on Kitt Peak are observing comet Tempel 1 for several nights before and after the planned Deep Impact event. Indeed, by the night of July 8, Kitt Peak National Observatory will have been used for 43 nights in 2005 in scientific support of the planned collision at approximately 10:52 p.m. local time on July 3 between the icy comet and a special probe released from the main Deep Impact spacecraft.

7 Junio 2005: The Kitt Peak Visitor Center will host a special public program on July 3, 2005, the night of the expected encounter between the NASA Deep Impact spacecraft and Comet Tempel 1.

15 Febrero 2005: Advance reservations are required for this free daytime program, which includes: a special tour of the WIYN 3.5-meter telescope (normally closed to public visitors), solar viewing, hands-on science activities, and talks by the director of Kitt Peak National Observatory and a leading cosmologist from the University of Arizona’s Steward Observatory about Einstein’s continuing influence on astronomy. Einstein was born 126 years ago in Germany on March 14, 1879, so we will be having some early birthday cake in his honor as well!

11 Enero 2005: A significant number of red giant stars whose output varies on timescales as short as 10 minutes has been found in the nearby Ursa Minor dwarf galaxy by an astronomer at the National Optical Astronomy Observatory (NOAO) and a summer undergraduate student. This surprising variability occurs on a much shorter timescale than previously thought possible for such mature, giant stars.

10 Enero 2005: The National Optical Astronomy Observatory (NOAO) has teamed with the Spitzer Science Center (SSC) to offer a dozen graduates from NOAO’s advanced teacher professional development program a unique chance to make research-quality observations with NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope.

3 Junio 2004: New observations from the WIYN 3.5-meter telescope on Kitt Peak show striking visual evidence for a galaxy being stripped bare of its star-forming material by its violent ongoing encounter with the hot gas in the center of a galaxy cluster.

2 Junio 2004: Astronomers have peered into the fog of the early universe and discovered a young and extremely distant galaxy at a time when the Universe was only about six percent of its present age. When compared with other recent findings about the “dark ages” of the early universe, this discovery suggests that this murky era could have lasted the better part of a billion years.

25 Mayo 2004: This image of Comet C/2001 Q4 (NEAT) was taken at the WIYN 0.9-meter telescope at Kitt Peak National Observatory near Tucson, AZ, on May 7, 2004.

21 Mayo 2004: Combining images from orbiting and ground-based telescopes, an international team of astronomers has located the eye of a cosmic hurricane: the source of the 1 million mile-per-hour winds that shower intergalactic space from the galaxy M82.

22 Enero 2004: A duo of Chinese and American astronomers have discovered a young star in the fierce environs of the Rosette Nebula that is ejecting a complex jet of material riddled with knots and bow shocks.

8 Enero 2004: Near the end of its lifetime, a star like the Sun ejects its outer layers into space, producing a hazy cloud of material called a planetary nebula. The complex shapes and dazzling colors of planetary nebulae make them some of the most popular objects in the night sky, for both amateur observing and scientific study.