Lick Observatory is an astronomical observatory on top of Mount Hamilton, 50 miles (80 kilometers) southeast of San Francisco. It is part of the University of California Observatories (UCO). Since 1966, its headquarters have been on the campus of the University of California at Santa Cruz.
The observatory includes several buildings that house one or more telescopes. Housing for scientists and other personnel is also on the mountain, which rises about 4,200 feet (1,280 meters) above sea level. The largest telescope is a reflector with a mirror 120 inches (305 centimeters) in diameter.
The observatory has a refracting telescope more than 100 years old. The telescope has a lens 36 inches (91 centimeters) in diameter and a tube 57 feet (17 meters) long. In 1892, Edward E. Barnard, an American astronomer, discovered the fifth satellite of the planet Jupiter with the telescope.
In 1929, Robert Trumpler of the observatory staff discovered the existence of dust clouds between stars. George Herbig later showed that stars form from the densest of these clouds. In 1969, Joseph Wampler and Joseph Miller used the observatory’s 120-inch reflector to make the first photograph of the “flashes” of a radio pulsar (see Pulsar ). Astronomers at the observatory have also searched for planets orbiting distant stars and supernovae (exploding stars) in distant galaxies.
