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Giant Magellan Telescope Set To Revolutionize Ground-Based Astronomy
StartsWithABang writes: If you want to see farther, deeper and at higher resolution than ever before into the Universe, you need four things: the largest aperture possible, the best-quality optical systems and cameras/CCDs, the least interference from the atmosphere, and the analytical techniques and power to make the most of every photon. While the last three have improved tremendously over the past 25 years, telescope size hasn't increased at all. That's all about to change over the next decade, as three telescopes — the Giant Magellan Telescope, the Thirty Meter Telescope and the European Extremely Large Telescope — are set to take us from 8-10 meter class astronomy to 25-40 meter class. While the latter two are fighting over funding, construction rights and other political concerns, the Giant Magellan Telescope is already under construction, and is poised to be the first in line to begin the future of ground-based astronomy.
I was incredibly fortunate to be invited to the official groundbreaking event for the GMT last November, which concluded with one of the most memorable experiences of my life.
Just a couple of kilometers away from the GMT site are the twin Magellan telescopes. These telescopes are both 6.5 meter aperture and have a large number of instruments that astronomers can use, with fairly easy switching between instruments. That night the telescope staff did something extremely rare. They fitted the Clay telescope with an actual eyepiece and all 190 guests were allowed to look through this 6.5 meter telescope! (The president of Chile got to go first, of course.) For this event, the telescope was trained on the saturn nebula and with this much aperture the colors were quite striking even to human eyes.
One of the astronomers told me that the number of people who have actually looked through such a telescope doubled that night.
and a REALLY BIG dust problem.
Is that much of a problem? Doesn't it just stay on the ground?
No, it doesn't..
Starships were meant to fly, Hands up and touch the sky - Nicky Minaj