Sri Lanka Planetarium
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| Established | 1 February 1965 |
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| Location | Prof. Stanley Wijesundaran Mawatha, Colombo 7, Sri Lanka. |
| Type | Planetarium |
| Director | K. P. K. Koralagama[1] |
| Website | www |
Sri Lanka Planetarium is a public planetarium located in Colombo, Sri Lanka. It is the first and only planetarium in the country and maintained as an institute under the Ministry of Science, Technology and Research.[2]
The Planetarium was established on 1 February 1965 by the State Engineering Corporation as an special feature for the Ceylon industrial exhibition held in Colombo same year.[3] The planetarium was designed by the chief engineer from the State Engineering Corporation of Ceylon, A. N. S. Kulasinghe, and was constructed by engineers from Germany.[4] The building takes elements from the Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral (Sir Frederick Gibberd - 1960) and the Cathedral of Brasília (Oscar Niemeyer - 1960).[5] The building has a reinforced concrete floor and a pre-stressed concrete folded plate roof, which was pre-cast on-site.[5] The building was funded by the German Democratic Republic as a gift to Ceylon.
With the aid of a universal projector stationed at the centre of this building, the artificial sky is created on the domed screen above a 570 seat auditorium.[6] The universal projector is a product of Carl Zeiss AG East Germany.
References
- ^ "Sri Lanka Planetarium". Government information centre. www.gic.gov.lk. Retrieved 15 November 2016.
- ^ "INSTITUTIONS#Planetarium". www.motr.gov.lk. Retrieved 15 November 2016.
- ^ "Our Planetarium". www.planetarium.gov.lk. Retrieved 15 November 2016.
- ^ "Planetarium". Amazinglanka. Retrieved 15 November 2016.
- ^ a b Pieris, Anoma (2013). Architecture and Nationalism in Sri Lanka: The Trouser Under the Cloth. Routledge. p. 164. ISBN 9780415630023.
- ^ "Sri Lanka Planetarium with enhanced technology to be opened today". News First. 5 December 2014. Retrieved 15 November 2016.