David Heath Wednesday, 30 May 2012 12:21

Opinion and Analysis

Ever since Galileo turned his simple telescope toward Jupiter and saw its four principal moons, we have been in awe of such devices. But they do come with limitations.

However, until the invention of the reflecting telescope some 200 years after Galileo, there was no obvious way to make them large enough to see into the far reaches of the heavens.

In fact for some considerable period of time, big-ish telescopes were constructed using both technologies, but eventually one single reason meant that all super-large telescopes were made as Newtonian (reflector) telescopes, and not lens-based.

What is the principal reason that there has never been a successful, long-serving lens-based telescope with a lens diameter greater than 1 metre?

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Trivia - putting Astronomy under the microscope