Information on Service 'Observatory Codes'

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List of Observatory Codes assigned by the Minor Planet Center (MPC). The codes are used in cataloguing astrometric observations of small bodies in the solar system. A code is unique for a certain location and consists of three digits or one letter and two digits. In this representation, we give the observatory code, the geocentric coordinates, and the observatory designation.

For a list of all services and tables belonging to this service's resource, see Information on resource 'Observatory Codes'

Service Documentation

In addition to the values given in the original MPC list, we give the geocentric and geodetic latitudes and the height (more or less above sea level) computed from the parallax constants given in the source. The data in MPC's list is given to three to six decimal places, so the accuracy of these values is usually not better than a couple of dozen meters (and can be substantially worse at times).

Overview

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This service is published as follows:

local means it is listed on our front page, ivo_managed means it has a record in the VO registry.

Input Fields

The following fields are available to provide input to the service (with some renderers, some of these fields may be unavailable):

NameTable Head DescriptionUnitUCD
code Code Observatory Code assigned by the Minor Planet Center N/A meta.id
gdlat GD Lat. Geodetic latitude of the observatory WGS84 deg pos.earth.lat;pos.geocentric
height Alt. Altitude of the observatory m pos.earth.altitude
long Long. Longitude of the observatory deg pos.earth.lon
name Name Operator-chosen designation of the Observatory N/A meta.id;meta.main

Default Output Fields

The following fields are contained in the output by default. More fields may be available for selection; these would be given below in the VOTable output fields.

NameTable Head DescriptionUnitUCD
code Code Observatory Code assigned by the Minor Planet Center N/A meta.id
gclat GC Lat. Geocentric latitude of the observatory deg pos.earth.lat;pos.geocentric
gdlat GD Lat. Geodetic latitude of the observatory WGS84 deg pos.earth.lat;pos.geocentric
height Alt. Altitude of the observatory m pos.earth.altitude
long Long. Longitude of the observatory deg pos.earth.lon
map Map Link to an OpenStreetMap of this place N/A N/A
name Name Operator-chosen designation of the Observatory N/A meta.id;meta.main

VOTable Output Fields

The following fields are available in VOTable output. The verbosity level is a number intended to represent the relative importance of the field on a scale of 1 to 30. The services take a VERB argument. A field is included in the output if their verbosity level is less or equal VERB*10.

NameTable Head DescriptionUnitUCD Verb. Level
name Name Operator-chosen designation of the Observatory N/A meta.id;meta.main 20
code Code Observatory Code assigned by the Minor Planet Center N/A meta.id 20
long Long. Longitude of the observatory deg pos.earth.lon 20
gclat GC Lat. Geocentric latitude of the observatory deg pos.earth.lat;pos.geocentric 20
gdlat GD Lat. Geodetic latitude of the observatory WGS84 deg pos.earth.lat;pos.geocentric 20
height Alt. Altitude of the observatory m pos.earth.altitude 20
map Map Link to an OpenStreetMap of this place N/A N/A 20

Citation Info

VOResource XML (that's something exclusively for VO nerds)