The Udaipur Solar Observatory (USO) was founded in 1975 and is situated on an island in the middle of the Lake Fatehsagar. The sky conditions at Udaipur are quite favourable for solar observations. The large water body surrounding the telescopes decreases the amount of heating of the surface layers. This decreases the turbulence in the air mass and thereby improves the image quality and seeing. The main objective of obtaining the high spatial and temporal resolution observations of solar photospheric and chromospheric activity is to understand the various dynamic phenomena occurring on the surface of the Sun.

1. Multi Application Solar Telescope (MAST): 50 cm off-axis telescope for high resolution observations. It is having alt-azimuth mount for solar tracking, thermal control for the entire system for obtaining good image quality.

 

• Adaptive optics for correcting the image distortion due to atmospheric seeing.
• Back-end instruments for narrow wavelength band imaging.
• Polarimeter for polarization measurement for solar magnetic field observations.
• High resolution multi-slit spectrograph for spectral studies.

 

2. SPAR telescope : 6 inch, low scatter refractor, for full-disk and moderate resolution solar observations. 

The island observatory situated in the middle of Fateh sagar lake provides a stable seeing condition for solar observations.