* Astronomy

In a departure from its core activities of providing networking and IT support to SMEs, Cardiff-based TiGra Networks has set up and automated two astronomical observatories for Space Exploration Limited, based in County Roscommon, Ireland. The project has been developed over the past 18 months.

The contract developed out of TiGra Networks' founder Tim Long's passion for astronomy. Long told Ping Wales: “I’ve had an interest in astronomy for years. I have been writing software for amateur astronomers and that’s how Eamonn Ansbro, the director of Kingsland Observatory, found our website.”

The observatories based at the Kingsland Observatory have two primary instruments a 36-inch Newtonian reflector, reportedly the largest optical telescope in the British Isles, and a 16-inch Schmidt Cassegrain. They will assist the Kingsland Observatory in asteroid surveys and the search for new minor planets known as Edgeworth-Kuiper Belt Objects (EKBOs) and in particular Planet X, a theoretical tenth planet, which could lie at the outermost reaches of the solar system.

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