New Automation Technology Helps High-Precision Telescope Observations

The European Southern Observatory (ESO) continues to enable exciting scientific advances that help us better understand the universe. Case in point: Observations made with ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) revealed in 2020 that a star orbiting the supermassive black hole at the center of the Milky Way moves just as predicted by Albert Einstein’s general theory of relativity. This long-sought-after result was made possible by high-precision measurements, in which PC-based control technology from Beckhoff played a key role.