VISTA (telescope)

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VISTA is the Visible & Infrared Survey Telescope for Astronomy, a 4m telescope in development which is being built at Paranal Observatory in Chile. It is hoped that it will be operational in 2007. It will have a wide field of view, and as the name suggests it will focus on optical and infrared surveys of the sky. VISTA is being built close to ESO's VLT by a consortium of 18 UK universities.

VISTA will not be operational until spring / summer 2007, as the mirror is still being ground. While it is called the Visible and Infra-red Survey Telescope for Astronomy, it will only have a near-infrared camera. Originally there was going to be a visible camera, but there are now insufficient funds. While some money has been raised for a wide survey camera to measure the dark energy content of the universe (Dark Cam), ESO would prefer this to go on another telescope so it does not disrupt the infra-red surveys. The near-infrared camera will be the fastest surveying instrument in the near-infrared. Currently WFCAM on the UK InfraRed Telescope (UKIRT) is the fastest. ESO is in the process of selecting public surveys for VISTA which will take up 75% of the available observing time.