The Bareket Observatory (IAU

International Astronomical Union

The International Astronomical Union IAU is a collection of professional astronomers, at the Ph.D. level and beyond, active in professional research and education in astronomy...

 code B35 ; 35.0317°N Parallax sinφ 0.84991 cosφ +0.52524) is an astronomical educational observatory owned and operated by the Bareket family. It is located east of the city of Maccabim

Modi'in-Maccabim-Re'ut

Modi'in-Maccabim-Re'ut is a city in the Center District of Israel located approximately halfway between Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. It was formed in 2003 by the merger of Modi'in and Maccabim-Re'ut...

, near Modiin.

Also serves as the official International Dark-Sky Association

International Dark-Sky Association

The International Dark-Sky Association is a U.S.-based non-profit organization incorporated in 1988 by founders Dr. David Crawford, a professional astronomer, and Dr. Timothy Hunter, a medical doctor/amateur astronomer...

 representative of the region.

Equipment

The observatory developed the Israeli Internet telescope, a robotic telescope system which enables students and teachers to have full control on its state of the art telescopic system, cooled CCD camera and CFW from their home or school, from any part of the world that have an Internet connection. The Internet telescope is being offered for no charge to all the students and teachers in Israel as a part of the observatory IYA2009 activities (usage regulations available on the observatory's web site).

The observatory also has a 38 cm diameter astrograph telescope

Astrograph

An astrograph is a telescope designed for the sole purpose of astrophotography. Astrographs are usually used in wide field surveys of the night sky as well as detection of objects such as asteroids, meteors, and comets.-Design:...

, which is a wide field reflector mounted on a robotic computer-controlled equatorial mount

Equatorial mount

An equatorial mount is a mount for instruments that follows the rotation of the sky by having one rotational axis parallel to the Earth's axis of rotation. This type of mount is used for astronomical telescopes and cameras...

. It equipped with a cooled CCD

Charge-coupled device

A charge-coupled device is a device for the movement of electrical charge, usually from within the device to an area where the charge can be manipulated, for example conversion into a digital value. This is achieved by "shifting" the signals between stages within the device one at a time...

 camera

Camera

A camera is a device that records and stores images. These images may be still photographs or moving images such as videos or movies. The term camera comes from the camera obscura , an early mechanism for projecting images...

, 10 positions computerized filter wheel, photometric filters and a spectrograph

Spectrograph

A spectrograph is an instrument that separates an incoming wave into a frequency spectrum. There are several kinds of machines referred to as spectrographs, depending on the precise nature of the waves...

. The observatory's visitors uses a variety of telescopes; as 8" and 11" SCTs and a special planetary 12" bino-reflector.

Once a year the observatory is producing the Astronomical Olympics for schools.

Observatory's stated goals

The observatory is open to anyone who has an interest in the night sky and wishes to learn about the universe in a scientific manner.

The observatory maintains astronomy courses and classes as an integral part of the observatory's activities.

• Developing new methods of communication.
• Developing new techniques to improve multicultural cooperation.
• To promote and distribute the latest technological advances to within the educational system
• Adapting the use of new astronomical, technological and scientific tools to enhance the learning experience.
• Enabling all students with equal opportunity to benefit from all of the advances in our research program.

Outreach and activities

Besides the regular activities that are taking place at the observatory, it also set up public observations in remote areas for schools and individuals that don't have the ability of going to an observatory for physical or financial reasons. Once a year the observatory makes the Astronomical Olympics for schools and developing the state of the art tools for remote learning, such as:

• Remote controlled Mars rover diorama, as a part of the Planetary society's Mars Station Project
• Remote controlled Internet telescope (The Israeli Internet telescope) which serves great amount of educators and students all over the world.
• Live astronomical web casts which open to all the interested.
• A monthly Astronomical magazine, in Hebrew.
• Open public observations, on special events, which usually attract hundreds of participants.

External links

• Hebrew version
• English version
• Public outreach at the Bareket observatory
• Article on educational activities, Universetoday site
• Article on educational activities, Astrophotoinsight site
• Activities in Israel, Captain Internet, HaAretz newspaper (Hebrew)
• International year of Astronomy 2009