optical telescopes
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India’s Liquid Mirror Telescope Is Ready for Its Close-up
High in the Himalayas, a new telescope is set to observe the night sky. The contraption has a 4-metre (3.96 m) lens, but here’s the kicker: it’s made of liquid mercury, a material seldom used for astronomical imaging.
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The World’s Largest Digital Camera Is Almost Ready to Look Back in Time
In an old experimental hall previously used for particle physics experiments, a team of French engineers are checking the filters on what will be the largest digital camera ever built. It’s October 2021, and I’m seeing the camera during its assembly at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory in Menlo Park, California. When this high-resolution imager is…