4-05-01
NEW MEHALSO OBSERVATORY TO BE DEDICATED
Students, faculty, and visitors to the popular Open House Nights in Astronomy at Penn State Erie, The Behrend College, will be observing the skies more clearly thanks to an advanced telescope and observatory to be dedicated later this month.
The new equipment is a gift of Robert and Elizabeth
Mehalso of Fairport, New York, and their family. Robert Mehalso, a
native of Springboro, Pennsylvania, is a 1964 graduate of Penn State.
He attended Penn State Behrend in 1961 and 1962.
"The Mehalso family's gift gave us the opportunity to choose
a telescope that was right for both the students and the community,"
said Dr. Roger Knacke, director of Penn State Behrend's School of
Science. "Our new telescope gives clearer, sharper images of
objects in the sky, so students will get the best observations for
classroom study. Visitors to our monthly Open House Nights in Astronomy
will enjoy crisper views of the nighttime skies."
The new Meade Instruments Corporation refracting
telescope is four feet long and has a lens that is seven inches in
diameter. It is completely computer-controlled with software that
permits automated access to thousands of objects in the sky. The telescopic
images can be transmitted to a larger viewing screen placed just outside
the observatory or in the Otto Behrend Science Building lecture hall.
The Mehalsos' gift includes a charged coupled device (CCD) that is
used to record and save pictures from the telescope. The CCD is similar
to a digital camera but offers astronomers a broader range of photographic
options.
The new telescope is housed in an Ash dome, an observatory building
made by the Ash Manufacturing Company. Fourteen feet in diameter at
its base, the dome is more than fourteen feet high. Both telescope
and dome rotate, and a panel in the dome slides back for telescopic
viewing. The observatory site is fully handicapped accessible with
paved walkways and wider doors.
Behrend's older, smaller observatory is still
in use, Knacke said. It houses a twelve-inch reflecting telescope.
Behrend physics and astronomy students will use this telescope for
undergraduate research projects.
"With the addition of this new observatory, we have a great facility
for astronomical observations," said Knacke. "It's a gift
to Penn State Behrend and to the Erie community. Our next Astronomy
Open House Night is scheduled for April 19, and a follow-up program
will be held on Astronomy Day, April 28. I invite the community to
come out and enjoy this wonderful new addition to the college."
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Contact: Loretta Brandon
(814) 898-6063 (O)
(814) 864-9922 (H)
e-mail: lzb6@psu.edu