The STELLA robotic observatory

STELLA is a robotic observatory with two fully automatic telescopes (STELLA-I and STELLA-II) located at the Teide Observatory in Tenerife, Spain. Not only the telescopes are automatic but also the entire observatory, no human presence is needed for observing - not even in remote control. STELLA-I supports a high-resolution, fiber-fed and benchmounted echelle spectrograph and a wide-field CCD imaging photometer while STELLA-II feeds a similar but wide-band imaging photometer and a testbed for prototype adaptive optics for robotic telescopes. The first telescope is scheduled for first light in November 2004, the second telescope for March 2005. (© 2004 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)