About Subaru Telescope

The Subaru Telescope, completed in 1999 atop the summit of 4200 meters Maunakea on the Island of Hawai‘i, operates as a branch of NAOJ. This 8.2-meter optical-infrared telescope serves astronomers from Japan and around the world as they explore the cosmos in an unending quest to gain a deeper and more accurate understanding of everything around us. Research with the telescope ranges from mapping satellites around the planets in our Solar System to searching for planets around nearby stars to observing the most distant objects at the edge of the known Universe. To facilitate such a wide range of research interests, Subaru Telescope not only maintains a variety of nine high-performance imagers and spectrographs but also develops new instruments. The Hawai‘i- based staff shares responsibilities for keeping the telescope operating at peak performance; for upgrading and maintaining its highly technical and state-of-the art systems; and for reaching out to the worldwide scientific community to inspire sustainable and long-term support for the Subaru Telescope.