" WOW " - "high-precision astronomical installation." It is a wide-angle aperture telescope of the catadioptric scheme of the “Super Schmidt” family, designed mainly for observing artificial Earth satellites . It is usually equipped with a special three- or four-axis mount that allows you to quickly aim and effectively accompany any object in the sky and track it, even if it moves at an arbitrary angle to the celestial equator (ordinary two-axis mounts have areas in the celestial sphere where they must rotate when accompanied by an object with a very large, and practically unrealizable speed (the so-called "dead zones"), as a result of which their use is not justified).
Content
History of the creation of "WOW"
On June 30, 1961, Decree of the Council of Ministers of the USSR No. 578-240 “On the Development and Production of High Precision Astronomical Installations“ VAU ”” was issued. The WOW network was developed, throughout the USSR, which made it possible to survey the sky and search for satellites.
Similar instruments that perform satellite surveys and observations were available in the USA, Japan, and Western Europe.
The very first “WOW” in the USSR was installed at the Zvenigorod station of the INASAN RAS [1] . At this “WOW”, the first innovative ideas for the operation of this installation were developed. The radiation receiver is an 8 mm film with a frame length of up to 360 mm. For a long time, satellites were observed on it. Currently involved in monitoring space debris .
Specifications
The Astrodar “WOW” lens has a scheme of the Maksutov-Sosnina family of super schmidts, in its design and correction capabilities similar to the Linfoot-Haukins super-schmidt scheme.
- Diameter of the main mirror: 1070–1100 mm
- Input Aperture Diameter: 500mm
- Focal Length: 700mm
- Relative Hole: 1: 1.4
- Effective Relative Hole: 1: 1.8
- Frame size linear: 60 × 360 mm
- Angular frame size: 5 ° × 30 °
- Blur circle diameter: 30 microns
- Dome Diameter: 25m
Location
The VAU telescopes are located in various parts of the former USSR and form a wide observational network.
Zvenigorod Observatory , Byurakan Astrophysical Observatory , Spassk-Dalniy, Tajikistan.
Notes
- ↑ WOW Camera Archived September 27, 2007 on Wayback Machine
See also
- Station of optical observations "Arkhyz"