Palomar-Observatorium

Palomar Observatory is an astronomical observatory located in San Diego County, California, United States, 145km southeast of Los Angeles, California, in the Palomar Mountain Range. It is owned and operated by the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) located in Pasadena, California. Research time is granted to Caltech and its research partners, which include the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) and Cornell University.The observatory operates several telescopes, including the famous 200-inch (200in) Hale Telescope and the 48-inch (48in) Samuel Oschin Telescope. In addition, other instruments and projects have been hosted at the observatory, such as the Palomar Testbed Interferometer and the historic 18-inch (18in) Schmidt telescope, Palomar Observatory's first telescope, dating from 1936.HistoryHale's vision for large telescopes and Palomar ObservatoryAstronomer George Ellery Hale, whose vision created the Palomar Observatory, built the world's largest telescope four times. He published an article in the April 1928 issue of Harper's Magazine called "The Possibilities of Large Telescopes". This article contained Hale's vision for building what was to become the 200-inch Palomar reflector; it was an invitation to the American public to learn about how large telescopes could help answer questions relating to the fundamental nature of the universe. Hale hoped that the American people would understand and support his project. In fact, the 200-inch telescope was the most important telescope in the world from 1949 until 1992, when the W. M. Keck Observatory built the Keck I telescope (at approximately 10m) on Mauna Kea in Hawaii which became the world's largest.