The Ondřejov Observatory (; ) is the principal observatory of the Astronomical Institute of the Czech Academy of Sciences. It is located in the municipality of Ondřejov, southeast of Prague, Czech Republic. It has a wide telescope, which is the largest in the Czech Republic.
History The facility was constructed in 1898, by Czech amateur astronomer and entrepreneur Josef Jan Frič as a private observatory. On 28 October 1928, he donated the facility to the Czechoslovak state to celebrate the tenth anniversary of its independence.Dorschner, J., & Löffler, G., Astronomy, a Popular History, (New York City: Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1975). The observatory, located at an altitude of , away from the air and light pollution of urban Prague, was administered by Charles University until the founding of the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences in 1953, which from then on operated it as part of its Astronomical Institute in conjunction with other Czechoslovak observatories.
In 1967, a telescope measuring in width was added to the observatory, which at that time was the 7th largest telescope in the world. Now it is the largest telescope in the Czech Republic and is in the second hundred in the world.
It has been responsible, among other scientific achievements, for the discovery of numerous asteroids; more recent works of astronomers from Ondřejov include examination of the trajectory and origin of the Chelyabinsk meteor. More than 700 minor planets have been discovered at this observatory. While most of these discoveries are officially credited to the astronomers who discovered them, a remaining 23 minor planets are directly credited to "Ondrejov" (the observatory itself) by the Minor Planet Center for the period 1997–2008.
The main-belt asteroid 7204 Ondřejov, discovered by Petr Pravec in 1995, was named for the village where the observatory is located.
+ Minor planets discovered: 23 see
List of discovered minor planets
31139 Garnavich 25 September 1997 37788 Suchan 25 September 1997 42924 Betlem 2 October 1999 42981 Jenniskens 2 October 1999 53285 Mojmír 24 March 1999 76713 Wudia 6 May 2000 82559 Emilbřezina 28 July 2001 26 August 2001 28 September 2002 28 July 2001 127196 Hanaceplechová 16 April 2002 29 July 2001 26 April 2000 16 February 1999 8 March 2002 23 September 1999 15 August 2001 5 November 2008 14 October 2001 19 September 2001 12 October 2001 6 November 2008 2 December 1999
Gallery
See also List of asteroid-discovering observatories List of astronomical observatories
List of observatory codes
References
External links
Astronomical Institute, responsible for the observatory Photos of the observatory News from Ondřejov Photometric Program Numbered asteroids discovered at Ondřejov, 1 June 2018