Mt Stromlo Observatory

This book tells the story of the Mt. Stromlo Observatory in Canberra which began life as a government department, later becoming an optical munitions factory producing gun sights and telescopes during the Second World War, before changing its focus to astrophysics – the new astronomy.

In the ensuing years programs were introduced to push the Observatory in new directions at the international frontiers of astronomy. The astronomers built new, better and larger telescopes to unravel the secrets of the universe. There were controversies, exciting new discoveries and new explanations of phenomena that had been discovered. The Observatory and its researchers have contributed to determining how old the universe is, participated in the largest survey of galaxies in the universe, and helped to show us that the universal expansion is accelerating – research that led to Brian Schmidt and his international team being awarded the 2011 Nobel Prize for physics.

These and other major discoveries are detailed in this fascinating book about one of the great observatories in the world.

Key Features:
* Mt Stromlo is an important part of the history of Canberra, an Australian icon, and one of the great observatories of the world
* Written by eminent members of the Mt. Stromlo Observatory team
* Released to coincide with Canberra’s centenary celebrations
* Illustrated with historical documents and wonderful and exciting images of the universe we live in
* Includes Brian Schmidt’s Nobel lecture

Ragbir Bhathal is an award-winning author and astrophysicist at the University of Western Sydney. He has published eight books on astronomy and several papers in international refereed journals. He is the Director of the Australian Optical SETI Project.

Ralph Sutherland is a Research Fellow at the Australian National University. He has published widely in international refereed journals, and has a textbook on the astrophysics of the interstellar medium.

Harvey Butcher is well known for the discovery of the Butcher-Oemler effect and the design and implementation of advanced astronomical instrumentation including LOFAR (Low Frequency Array for Radio Astronomy), one of the largest radio telescopes in the world. He was awarded the knighthood of the Order of the Netherlands Lion in 2005.