Star gazing in style

miscellany

The University of Mysore is regarded to be one of the most prestigious universities in India. The Department of Physics is acclaimed to be the most resourceful department since 1960s due to the contributions of many stalwarts like Dr  Chandrashekar, Dr Gopal, Prof Srinivas Rao, Prof Sanjeevaiah, Dr A V Gopal Rao and so on.

The Astronomy section in the department is active from the past three decades. Earlier, the department had a small 6-inch telescope useful for sky watching. But now, it has a robust 11-inch telescope, highly beneficial in locating deep sky objects.

A small observatory has also been set up to make sky observations comfortably. The observatory has a powerful reflecting telescope – CELESTRON 11” which has Celestron’s acclaimed Schmidt – Cassegrain optical system. The CELESTRON 11” is a portable telescope housed in the observatory.

This was recently inaugurated by Dr Sreekumar, director, Indian Institute of Astrophysics, Bangalore.

Astronomical observations, like any other walk of life today, have been profoundly revolutionised by the “silicon chip”. This telescope consists of the largest aperture of the Celestron CPC GPS XLT line, the Celestron CPC 1100 GPS XLT Schmidt-Cassegrain Telescope which delivers the maximum light gathering power and a limiting magnitude of nearly 15. The Celestron CPC 1100 GPS XLT takes full advantage of its vast database of thousands of New General Catalogue objects and Abel galaxies and provides a new level of detail to all favourite deep sky objects. Some of the admirable features of this telescope are premium StarBright XLT coatings, fully computerised dual fork arm Altazimuth mount, newly designed heavy-duty tripod, ergonomic design, most comfortable viewing position of the objects and a convenient remote hand control holder.

The telescope will really serve not only the cause of research scholars of Physics departments, also for the student community of other institutions in the city and rural areas.

As the eternal unconquered regions of space beacon man with a challenge, it is the cherished desire of University of Mysore that the students who pass through its portals gaze in wonder at the breathtaking creations of nature and develop a quest for knowledge and exploration of the unknown. For those whom the cosmos serves as a source of inspiration, CELESTRON 11” will be the first step of satisfaction to reveal the opulence of astronomy.