BOOTES

BOOTES (Burst Observer and Optical Transient Exploring System) is a global network of robotic astronomical observatories with seven sites located in Spain (two stations), New Zealand, China, Mexico, South Africa and Chile.

[1] While the BOOTES-1 station in Spain is devoted to wide-field astronomy, the additional stations (BOOTES-2 in Spain, BOOTES-3 in New Zealand, BOOTES-4 in China, BOOTES-5 in Mexico, BOOTES-6 in South Africa and BOOTES-7 in Chile) include a similar setup (hardware and software): the 0.6m diameter robotic telescope, the EMCCD camera at the Cassegrain focus and the u'g'r'i'ZY filterset (only the u' filter is lacking in BOOTES-2), which makes the BOOTES Network a unique resource for combining the data from all the instruments worldwide.

BOOTES provides an automated real time response to the detection of Gamma Ray Bursts (GRBs) and other incoming alerts (neutrino sources, gravitational waves, etc.).

Its scientific objectives include: Its principal investigator is Prof. Alberto J. Castro-Tirado (IAA-CSIC and UMA), who conceived the project at the time of his PhD.

[3] The project also focused on performing rapid follow up observations of events detected by several spacecraft (BATSE, BeppoSAX, RossiXTE, IPN, Hete-2, Swift, and Fermi).