Jacobus Kapteyn Telescope | |
The Jacobus Kapteyn Telescope in 2011 against a background of clouds as the sun rises.
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Organization | Isaac Newton Group of Telescopes |
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Location | La Palma, Canary Islands |
Wavelength | Optical |
Diameter | 1m |
Mounting | Equatorial Cross-axis |
The Jacobus Kapteyn Telescope or JKT is a 1m optical telescope of the Isaac Newton Group of Telescopes on La Palma in the Canary Islands. It was funded by Netherlands and the United Kingdom and completed in the early 1980s. Planning procceded throughout the 1970s and it came online in 1983-1984. It can be used with 2 different focal points, and different instruments, although by 1998 this was refined to one instrument. The telescope weighs in total about 40 metric tons according to JKT documentation.
Now superseded by more recent and larger telescopes it was taken out of service as a common user facility in the middle of 2003.
It is named for the Dutch astronomer Jacobus Kapteyn.