The Thuringian State Observatory in Tautenburg and the Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Optics and Precision Engineering IOF in Jena are jointly developing a key technology that can be used for astronomical measurements of stars and in modern devices for transmitting encrypted data. The FREEFIB research group is focusing on the development of compact adaptive optics for the efficient feeding of light into a single-mode fiber optic cable. Anyone who has looked up at the starry sky on a clear night is ...

Astronomers at the Thuringian State Observatory have teamed up with international researchers and measured supersonic winds around the equator of WASP-127b, a giant exoplanet. These supersonic jets can reach speeds up to 33.000 kilometers per hour. The discovery provides unique insights into the weather patterns of a distant world. Up until a few years ago, astronomers could only measure the mass and the radius of extrasolar planets (planets around other stars than our Sun). Now, high-resolution instruments like CRIRES+ at the ...

As part of an international consortium, the Thuringian State Observatory has put a new spectrograph into operation. This optical instrument is used to study the activity of stars and discover possible companions. The spectrograph was installed on the modernized 1.52-metre telescope of the European Southern Observatory in La Silla, Chile, in November 2024 and is ready for operation. This means that the Thuringian State Observatory now also has an observation instrument for the night sky of the southern hemisphere. With the ...

After just two years of development and construction, the Thuringian State Observatory now has a modern solar laboratory.  Guests from politics, research and industry will come to Tautenburg for the inaugural ceremony on October 17, 2024. The Thuringian State Observatory has a new observation facility. The light of the sun is studied in the Tautenburg Solar Laboratory (TauSoL) in order to better understand its magnetic cycle. The laboratory is also used to develop a prototype for automated solar observatories. Their data ...

Young stars brighten considerably when they go through phases of rapid growth. Such episodes are known as accretion bursts. Researchers at the Thuringian State Observatory identified the most energetic accretion burst of a massive young star yet discovered. For the first time, they modeled how the thermal radiation of the dust in the vicinity of the young star changes during such an event. Such time-dependent simulations enable astronomers to better analyse accretion outbursts of young stars. Researchers at the Thuringian State ...