Technologies behind Giant Telescopes

Telescopes for centuries were built with a single reflective mirror. To see further in the distance, the mirror was increased in size. This worked up to about 5 meters in diameter before the mirror starts to deform due to breadth of the mirror and the impact of wind, gravity, and other factors. With the Keck telescope a new age of telescope was born using segmented mirrors each controlled individually.

Key technologies behind a large telescope such as the Extremely Large Telescope (ELT) by the European Southern Observatory include

Mirror actuators
Mirror metrology
Wind analysis & control
Mirror Phasing
Friction and drive systems
Option fabrication
Adaptive Optics
Fast optical detectors
Fibre lasers
And more

We'll explore these areas in the coming weeks.

Best regards,
Hall T.