Tag: telescope

Construction starts on the world’s largest optical telescope

After several years of planning and no shortage of financial anxiety , construction has officially started on the Extremely Large Telescope. Contractors are now building the main structure and dome of the Chile-based observer ahead of its initial service in 2024. That’s a long time to wait, but this is no mean feat. With a 43-yard aperture, this promises to be the world’s largest optical telescope for sometime, even compared to future or in-limbo projects like the Thirty Meter Telescope . Those gigantic dimensions will help it capture far more light, giving astronomers the chance to spot particularly distant galaxies, find small planets and capture more details of larger planets. The ELT’s full capabilities won’t come until sometime after 2024, when the ESO starts a second construction phase. It could easily be another few years after that before the telescope lives up to its expectations. However, it’s having some positive side effects right now: the start of construction also marks the connection of its home, the Paranal Observatory (where the Very Large Telescope resides) to the Chilean electrical grid. That simple addition promises more reliability, lower costs and a reduced environmental footprint. Don’t be shocked if more modest telescopes like the VLT benefit well before their larger sibling is ready for action. Via: Reuters Source: ESO

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Construction starts on the world’s largest optical telescope

The world’s biggest telescope needs half a billion dollars more

GMTO It has been a long road for planners of the Giant Magellan Telescope, which will become the world’s largest telescope—if it’s completed on schedule. Casting of the first of seven mirrors, each formed from about 20 tons of borosilicate glass made from Florida sand, began way back in 2005. The project seems to finally be closing in on first light as the team amps up fundraising and construction efforts. The organizers of the telescope are gearing up for fundraising needed to bring the project to completion and have hired a new president with significant executive experience: Robert N. Shelton, a former president of the University of Arizona and provost and executive vice chancellor of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. “Anyone who has been a president and a provost understands the importance of fundraising,” Shelton told Ars in an interview. Read 4 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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The world’s biggest telescope needs half a billion dollars more

NASA’s prettiest spaceship yet will take actual photos of alien worlds

PlanetQuest is NASA’s effort to search for new Earths, exoplanets like ours that would probably contain life too. They’re doing some really cool stuff, like this sunflower-telescope combo spaceship—”a cutting-edge effort to take pictures of planets orbiting stars far from the sun.” Imagine that—seeing the actual planets! Read more…        

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NASA’s prettiest spaceship yet will take actual photos of alien worlds