Catalina Sky Survey
| Alternative names | CSS |
|---|---|
| Survey type |
Astronomical survey 
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| Target |
near-Earth object
|
| Organization |
University of Arizona, National Aeronautics and Space Administration
|
| Observations |
Mount Lemmon Observatory
|
| Website | www |
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Catalina Sky Survey (CSS) is a project to discover comets and asteroids, and to search for near-Earth objects (NEOs). More specifically, CSS is to search for any potentially hazardous asteroids that may pose a threat of impact. Its southern hemisphere counterpart, the Siding Spring Survey (SSS) was closed in 2013 due to loss of funding.
The NEO Observations Program is a result of a United States 1998 congressional directive to NASA to begin a program to identify 1 kilometre (0.62 mile) or larger objects to around 90 percent confidence level or better. The Catalina Sky Survey, located at the Mount Lemmon Observatory in the Catalina Mountains north of Tucson, carries out searches for near-earth objects, NEOs, contributing to the Congressionally mandated goal.
In addition to identifying impact risks the project also obtains other scientific information, including: improving the known population distribution in the main belt, finding the cometary distribution at larger perihelion distances, determining the distribution of NEOs as a product of collisional history and transport to the inner Solar System, and identifying potential targets for flight projects.
Catalina Sky Survey (CSS) utilized two US telescopes, a 1.5 meter (60 inch) f/2 telescope on the peak of Mt. Lemmon, and a 68 cm (27 inch) f/ 1.7 Schmidt telescope near Mt. Bigelow (both in the Tucson, Arizona area). The CSS southern hemisphere counterpart, the Siding Spring Survey (SSS), used a 0.5 meter (20 inch) f/3 Uppsala Schmidt telescope at Siding Spring Observatory in Australia. All sites use identical, thermo-electrically cooled cameras and common software that was written by the CSS team. The cameras are cooled to approximately −100 °C (−148 °F) so their dark current is about 1 electron per hour. These 4096×4096 pixel cameras provide a field of view of 1 degree square on with the 1.5-m telescope and nearly 9 square degrees with the Catalina Schmidt. Nominal exposures are 30 seconds and the 1.5-m can reach objects fainter than 21.5 V in that time.
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