Planet Discovered Using Telephoto Camera Lenses

[rvr] writes "The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) reports the discovery of an extra-solar planet called XO-1b, which orbits a dim star in Corona Borealis every 4 days. To find it, the brightness of several thousand stars were regularly scanned using two mini-telescopes in Hawaii. This equipment was built using commercial hardware: two digital cameras, attached to telephoto camera lenses on a robotic equatorial mount. A team of amateur astronomers helped with their own equipment to discard or confirm dozens of suspected transits."

Comments

Re:Real ingenuity

[imsabbel]

Thats the dumb populistic approach.
In other words: "just because i cannot affort it, everybody has to make do with crappy tools".

Just take a minute and try to imagine what your "really ingenious" people could have done if they didnt have to waste their time and effort getting equipment doing stuff it wasnt designed for.