MOA TELESCOPE

Since 1995, the MOA group used a modified 0.6-m Boller & Chivens telescope at the Mt John University Observatory. In 2002, the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science & Technology of Japan made a grant to Professor Yasushi Muraki of Nagoya University for the 1.8-m telescope. This was subsequently supplemented by a donation by Graeme Murray and Hide Ozawa of Earth & Sky Ltd (Tekapo) for the telescope buildings.

Construction of the telescope was carried out by the following:-

• Main Contractor: Nishimura Optical Coy, Kyoto
• CCD Camera: STE Laboratory, Nagoya University
• Telescope Optical Design: Industrial Research Ltd, NZ
• Mirror Fabrication: Litkarino Ltd, Moscow
• Mirror Polishing: Lomo Coy, St Petersburg
• Field Corrector Lenses: Industrial Research Ltd, NZ
• Filters: Custom Scientific, Arizona

Construction of the telescope began in 2003. Photographs supplied by Fumio Abe,
Alan Gilmore, Fraser Gunn, John Hearnshaw, Yoshitaka Itow, Yasushi Muraki,
Yuji Nishimura, Takashi Sako and Tomohiro Sekiguchi  of the telescope at various
stages of construction are shown below (click thumbnails for full size). Higher resolution images are available from them.