Hubble, green with envy?

[Brian Ellis]

http://www.esa.int/esaSC/SEMM848X9DE_index_0.html

The Herschel space telescope has now had its optics assembled with a mirror 212% larger in area than Hubble, with a weight of a fraction of Hubble's.

It will be used mainly for long wavelength IR research, with its sensors cooled to only ~3 K (~-270°C), a field in which Europeans are already leading.

[Fat Tone]

Let's hope they painted their interferometer properly!

[Kooldino]

About time someone besides the US did something big in space lately.

So how is the mirror involved in the telescope?

[Nowhere]

Oh c'mon Kooldino, Huygens was european

And perhaps not very spectacular, but keeping ISS alive in the absence of Shuttles is quite big IMHO

[cjolley]

... with a mirror 212% larger in area than Hubble

Oh no you don't
Resolution?
If it focuses a longer wavelength doesn't it NEED a bigger mirrior?
And not need as much smoothness and (insert word for the "flatness" of curved surface here) ?


PS Not to not say congratulations and thanks for the contribution to science.

[Brian Ellis]

From what I've heard the optical resolution with visible light is state-of-the-art. The mirror aperture is the same for all wavelengths. I agree that for long IR the precision may be less important than for visible light, but ±2.5 µm over 3.5 m is pretty good (better than 1 ppm error!). I don't know what proportion of time will be used for visible, near IR and far IR work, but there is talk that it will detect water and organic molecules in far-off galaxies with the far-IR transmissions.

[Dr Mordrid]

The optical scopes do a poor job of looking into the universes "dark ages", which is to be the focus of most new research.

Enter JWST.

Dr. Mordrid