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Australia's Chief Scientist Professor Penny Sackett, assisted by some of the next generation of scientists from Shenton College, officially launched Western Australia's biggest telescope on 1 April, 2009.

The Zadko telescope , co-located with the Gravity Discovery Centre near Gingin, is part of a global network of telescopes linked to a NASA satellite ground station.

The telescope's unique geographical position in Western Australia makes it a vital global facility for the study of the transient universe, allowing it to explore of a huge section of unchartered and previously unmonitored space.

A major role will be joint international projects such as searching for potentially hazardous near-earth asteroids and tracing dangerous space junk while helping scientists learn about the formation of our own planet. It has already been the first in the world to detect the death of a star that occurred more than 11 billion years ago (before the Earth was formed).

The official launch held at the Centre for Information Technology, was attended by the family of telescope donor Jim Zadko, CEO of Claire Energy; Mr Lionel Majeste-Larrouy, the French Consul General in Australia; Mr Michael Wood, the French Honorary Consul in Perth; Chief Scientist of Australia, Professor Penny Sackett; Chief Scientist of Western Australia, Professor Lyn Beazley; UWA Vice-Chancellor, Professor Alan Robson; UWA Senior Research Fellow and Zadko project leader, Dr David Coward; UWA physicist and Director of the International Gravity Research Centre at Gingin, Professor David Blair; and ABC science broadcaster Robyn Williams.