We are proud to announce that on November 22nd, our partners in Hands-On Universe [Spain] from Fundación AstroHita appeared once again in 'Nature' journal of science. The article refered to the recently confirmed atmosphere -very faint and localized- at the dwarf planet Makemake. This contribution in which the astronomical complex based in Castilla la Mancha has participated is in the frame of the research of trans neptunian objects. The data collected by the 77 cm telescope in La Hita complex was useful to predict when the star was going to be hidden by Makemake.

“Astrometric refinement of the star’s and Makemake’s positions from CCD images obtained days prior to the occultation showed that the shadow path of the occultation would pass over South America (Fig. S1). A total of 108 astrometric measurements were obtained during 5 nights from images acquired at the f/3 0.77m telescope of La Hita observatory (Spain) in the period April 8th to April 12th 2011.”

Extract of the article published by 'Nature', num 491, pages 566-569 (November 22nd, 2012)

The effort that Fundación AstroHita made to improve their equipment permited to reach precise measurements and get this results. 

By clicking HERE, you can access the article in 'Nature'.

At the bottom of the website, there is a link to a PDF file that includes data provided by La Hita observatory.