About us

Hello, we're LUAstro - the Astronomy Society at Lancaster University! We offer the opportunity to use a semi-professional observatory on the rooftop of the University's Physics Department , with a 14" Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope, 11" Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope, a Coronado Solar H-alpha solar telescope, and our RedCat51 Astrophotography telescope - along with lots more. Whether you have no prior experience, or are a lifelong astronomer, we'd love to have you join us!

The Society was first founded by Dr Allan Chapman (now President of the Society for the History of Astronomy), who built the Society's first dome out of plywood in less than a month back in 1970. Today, the Society has a large collection of telescopes, including a 14" Schmidt-Cassegrain Telescope (SCT) that remains permanently in the Observatory Dome at the top of the university's Physics Building. Over time, the Society has become more and more intertwined with the Physics Department at the university; on Open Days you'll hear about the work we do, and you may even spot some of our posters outside researchers' offices in the department! Just this year we set up this website, and hope to have many more projects to come!

These are a couple of links that we find useful for Astronomy, as well as for the wider running of the society:

Here are some of our members' Astrophotography websites!

By joining our Exec you can add your name to this list!