Site of what was formerly the world's largest single-mirror optical telescope, with a mirror of 6 m/19.7 ft diameter, in the Caucasus Mountains of Russia. At the same site is the RATAN 600 radio telescope, consisting of radio reflectors in a circle of 600 m/2,000 ft diameter. Both instruments are operated by the Special Astrophysical Observatory of the Russian Academy of Sciences in St Petersburg.