With Telescope Live you can easily observe comets, asteroids and other solar system bodies.

Such objects, compared to deep-sky objects such as stars, galaxies or nebulae, change Right Ascension (RA) and Declination (Dec) on a very short timescale. This means that you will need to carefully calculate the right coordinates of the object at the time in which the observation is made.

RA and Dec coordinates can be obtained from ephemerides. In turn, ephemerides can be calculated using the orbital elements of the given object. 

There are online services generating such ephemerides, such as the Minor Planet & Comet Ephemeris Service and the JPL's HORIZONS system.

Using these tools, you can calculate the exact RA and Dec as a function of time, and then schedule the observations at a given time.

With Telescope Live, you can leave the complexities of calculating ephemerides, and use our automated algorithms to locate the object and automate the scheduling of the observations!

In order to use the Telescope Live minor planet scheduler, just select "Comet, asteroid or other solar system body' in the submission form for an Advanced Request.

The Target Name needs to be a name recognized by the Minor Planet Center. In fact, our systems are interfaced with the Minor Planet & Comet Ephemeris Service.

If you don't get any result when clicking RETRIEVE EPHEMERIDES, then you won't be able to use this feature, and you will need to rely on the manual calculation of RA and Dec for your solar system body.

If you do get the so-called MPC 1-line, as in the example above, then you can continue to the next step. Our systems will automatically check the observability of the target and offer telescopes from which your object is visible. 

In the last step, you will be able to use our automated scheduler without worrying about choosing the exact time at which your observations will run. We will dynamically calculate the RA and Dec coordinates and observe your object as soon as possible.

If you still want to be in control of the observing timing, then simply select Custom Scheduling in the last step of the request, and find an available observing slot.