European Extremely Large Telescope
 Engineer rendering of the 39-metre European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT)
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| Organisation | ESO |
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| Location(s) | Cerro Armazones, Chile, near Paranal Observatory |
| Coordinates | 24°35′20″S 70°11′32″W / 24.58889°S 70.19222°WCoordinates: 24°35′20″S 70°11′32″W / 24.58889°S 70.19222°W |
| Altitude | 3,060 m (10,040 ft) |
| Weather | 89% clear fraction 0.67″ median seeing at 500 nm |
| Wavelength | visible, near and mid-infrared |
| Built | start: July 2014 (construction) first light: by 2024 (expected) |
| First light | 2024 
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| Telescope style | Reflector |
| Diameter | 39.3 m (129 ft) |
| Secondary dia. | 4.09 m |
| Tertiary dia. | 3.75 m |
| Angular resolution | 0.001 to 0.65 arcsec depending on instrument |
| Collecting area | 978 m2 |
| Focal length | 34.5 m (f/0.88) primary 420–840 m (f/10 – f/20) final |
| Mounting | Nasmyth mount |
| Enclosure | classical |
| Website | eso |
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The European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT) is an astronomical observatory and the world's largest optical/near-infrared extremely large telescope now under construction. Part of the European Southern Observatory (ESO), it is located on top of Cerro Armazones in the Atacama Desert of northern Chile. The design comprises a reflecting telescope with a 39.3-metre-diameter segmented primary mirror and a 4.2-metre-diameter secondary mirror, and will be supported by adaptive optics, six laser guide star units and multiple large science instruments. The observatory aims to gather 13 times more light than the largest optical telescopes existing today, be able to correct for atmospheric distortions and provide images 16 times sharper than those from the Hubble Space Telescope.
The E-ELT is intended to vastly advance astrophysical knowledge by enabling detailed studies of planets around other stars, the first galaxies in the Universe, super-massive black holes, and the nature of the Universe's dark sector, and to detect water and organic molecules in protoplanetary disks around other stars. The facility is expected to take 11 years to construct.
On 11 June 2012, the ESO Council approved the E-ELT programme's plans to begin civil works at the telescope site, with construction of the telescope itself pending final agreement with governments of some member states. Construction work on the E-ELT site started in June 2014. In December 2014 ESO had secured over 90% of the total funding and authorized construction of the telescope to start, which will cost around one billion Euro for the first construction phase.First light is planned for 2024.
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