VLTI

Very Large Telescope

The four Unit Telescopes that form the VLT together with the Auxiliary Telescopes
Alternative names	VLT
Observatory	Paranal Observatory
Location(s)	Atacama Desert , Chile
Coordinates	24°37′38″S 70°24′15″W / 24.62733°S 70.40417°W / -24.62733; -70.40417Coordinates: 24°37′38″S 70°24′15″W / 24.62733°S 70.40417°W / -24.62733; -70.40417
Organization	European Southern Observatory
Altitude	2,635 m (8,645 ft)
Observing time	340 nights per year
Wavelength	300 nm – 20 μm (visible, near- and mid-infrared)
First light	1998 (for the first Unit Telescope)
Telescope style	optical telescope, Ritchey–Chrétien telescope
Diameter	4 x 8.2-metre Unit Telescopes (UT) 4 x 1.8-metre moveable Auxiliary Telescopes (AT)
Mounting	Altazimuth mount
Website	www.eso.org/public/teles-instr/vlt/
Location of Very Large Telescope
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The Very Large Telescope (VLT) is a telescope facility operated by the European Southern Observatory on Cerro Paranal in the Atacama Desert of northern Chile. The VLT consists of four individual telescopes, each with a primary mirror 8.2 m across, which are generally used separately but can be used together to achieve very high angular resolution. The four separate optical telescopes are known as Antu, Kueyen, Melipal and Yepun, which are all words for astronomical objects in the Mapuche language. The telescopes form an array which is complemented by four movable Auxiliary Telescopes (ATs) of 1.8 m aperture.

The VLT operates at visible and infrared wavelengths. Each individual telescope can detect objects roughly four billion times fainter than can be detected with the naked eye, and when all the telescopes are combined, the facility can achieve an angular resolution of about 0.001 arc-second. This is equivalent to roughly 2 meters resolution at the distance of the Moon. In single telescope mode of operation angular resolution is about 0.05 arc-second.

The VLT is the most productive ground-based facility for astronomy, with only the Hubble Space Telescope generating more scientific papers among facilities operating at visible wavelengths. Among the pioneering observations carried out using the VLT are the first direct image of an exoplanet, the tracking of individual stars moving around the supermassive black hole at the centre of the Milky Way, and observations of the afterglow of the furthest known gamma-ray burst.