Anglo-Australian Telescope

The Anglo-Australian Telescope is a 3.9-m equatorial mounted reflector telescope at Siding Spring Observatory, Australia, built in 1974. Among its instruments:

• AAOmega - dual beam spectrograph.
• HERMES - 4-channel spectrograph.
• KOALA - integral field unit (IFU) for AAOmega.
• 2dF - Two Degree Field facility: robotic fiber positioner for AAOmega and HERMES. (2dF is out of service in early 2025 with plans to return to service in September.)
• Veloce - high resolution (spectral resolution=80000) echelle spectrograph.

Former:

• IRIS2 - Wide-field spectrograph.
• SAMI - multiple IFU for AAOmega.
• UCLES - University College London Echelle Spectrograph.
• UHRF - Ultra High Resolution Facility echelle spectrograph.

Future:

• Hector - enlarged replacement for SAMI (with more fibers) plus additional spectrographs to use with it simultaneously with AAOmega.

2dF was commissioned in the mid 1990s, incorporating its own two spectrographs, plus a robot to position 392 fibers (for 392 targets) for either spectrograph while the other one was observing, imaging a circular 2°-diameter region of the of the celestial sphere covering more than 3 square degrees. Around 2006, the two spectrographs were replaced by the more advanced AAOmega.