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LBT Publishes "First Light" Image

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on Tue Oct 25, 2005 10:04 PM
from the still-too-much-of-that-air-stuff-in-the-way dept.
Space Technology
FarmKing writes "The Large Binocular Telescope has achieved "first light" and published it's first image of NGC891. The image was taken with one of it's two 8.4 Meter (~655 ft^2) mirrors. When fully operational, LBT will be one of the largest optical telescopes in the world."
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[+] Powerful Optical Telescope Captures First Binocular Images 83 comments
The Large Binocular Telescope consists of two 8.4-meter mirrors which function in tandem to provide resolution greater than that of the Hubble Telescope. The LBT's first "binocular" images were captured recently, marking the end to a long and laborious construction process. We previously discussed the LBT when images were captured from the first mirror to be installed. Quoting: "The LBT ... will combine light to produce the image sharpness equivalent to a single 22.8-meter (75-foot) telescope. 'To have a fully functioning binocular telescope is not only a time for celebration here at LBT, but also for the entire astronomy community,' UA Steward Observatory Director, Regents' Professor and LBT Corp. President Peter A. Strittmatter said. 'The images that this telescope will produce will be like none seen before. The power and clarity of this machine is in a class of its own. It will provide unmatched ability to peer into history, seeing the birth of the universe.'"
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LBT Publishes "First Light" Image 33 Comments More /

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  • hubble? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Ojuice (638639)
    So what are the technical specs. of this telescope compared to the Hubble?

    • Re:hubble? (Score:5, Informative)

      by beeplet (735701) <beeplet@gmail.com> on Tuesday October 25 2005, @10:34PM (#13877920) Homepage Journal
      From this page [arizona.edu] it looks like the two telescopes in combination have a resolution 10x that of Hubble. Hubble's primary mirror is 2.4 m in diameter compared to the LBT's 8.4 m (but atmospheric distortion lowers the resolution of ground-based telescopes). The main advantage to the dual-telescope set-up is not the increased resolution, but the ability to do optical interferometry: cancel out the signal that you don't want, or select for the signal that you do.

      The Keck Telescope [nasa.gov] in Hawaii is also designed to do optical interferometry, though I'm not sure what kind of results they have gotten so far.

      • Re:hubble? (Score:4, Informative)

        by deglr6328 (150198) on Wednesday October 26 2005, @02:01AM (#13878697)
        The Kecks, though they are capable of nulling interferometry, are not capable of imaging interferometry. Or at least they will not be capable of it until they complete the construction of the 4(?) small "outrigger" telescopes around the two Kecks currently on the top of the mountain. The completion of these small outriggers has been delayed for several years however because of the (idiotic) cries of "oh noes it will disturb the sacred mountain spirits so you can't build anything there ever anymore!!" from native Hawaiian tribe organizations. The binocular telescope in Arizona, when finished, will be ready right away to perform full imaging aperture synthesis with a ~22 meter baseline and simultaneous adaptive optics correction (with future capability for advanced multi-conjugate [eso.org] adaptive optics correction). This should (theoretically) allow near .005 arcsecond resolution in the visible spectrum to be achieved. Very exciting.
        • That is very impressive. I doubt you could do better on the Moon.

        • Re:hubble? (Score:4, Insightful)

          by Somegeek (624100) on Wednesday October 26 2005, @06:24AM (#13879395)
          deglr6328 stated:
          The completion of these small outriggers has been delayed for several years however because of the (idiotic) cries of "oh noes it will disturb the sacred mountain spirits so you can't build anything there ever anymore!!" from native Hawaiian tribe organizations.
          Why are they idiotic cries? Just because it is not your religion's most sacred site that is being desecrated doesn't mean that it doesn't matter or isn't important. How far would this project get if its proposed site was the Wailing Wall, or Saint Catherine's Monastery on Mount Sinai?
          • Why did I say they are idiotic? I didn't think I'd actually have to spell it out but...well, here we go. They are idiotic complaints for the same reason every other religious/superstitious complaint against the advancement of science is entertained these days. They are idiotic because when the progress of science and rational inquiry into the workings of the universe are held to the fickle whims and fears of irrational belief systems, then in my opinion that is an embarrassing and gross failure of the pursu

            • It baffles me beyond words that a (ANY) religious belief system could be so unbelievably willfully ignorant, nearsighted and completely arrogant as to assume their mythical belief system, unsupported by evidence nor reason could even hope to compare to the fantastic wonders of the cosmos which are revealed by actually studying it through the use of telescopes at the top of Mauna Kea. There have been something like 100 planets outside of our solar system which have been discovered using the telescopes on tha

        • I agree with the previous reply.
          Hawaiians deserve the same respect for their religion/culture as everybody else.

          If you don't like it, build it in your back yard. If your back yard is not a suitable spot, tough luck.

  • Show offs (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 25 2005, @10:08PM (#13877818)
    We mere amateurs usually pick the moon, Jupiter or maybe M31 ... but NGC891?? That's just pompous!

  • 24 million years ago? (Score:3, Funny)

    by fodi (452415) on Tuesday October 25 2005, @11:17PM (#13878051)
    Okay, someone help me out here. The article says that NGC891 is 24 million light years away. From my understanding we're, therefore, looking at a picture of the light that left NGC891 24 million years ago. right? wrong?

    If so, why spend all that money to find out what something looked at 24 million years ago (unless you're trying to identify the brown liquid lying at the bottom of my fridge)?

    • Re:24 million years ago? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by QuantumG (50515) <qg@biodome.org> on Tuesday October 25 2005, @11:46PM (#13878174) Homepage Journal
      Cause we still don't understand how the universe was formed. Astronomy is the pure research that drives the study of physics. We have no hope of developing a unified theory without further astronomical research. Want nuclear fusion? Want new sensors, or new materials? It all comes back to physics. Our fundamental understanding of the rules of the universe is what defines our capabilities. Similarly for particle accelerators and other pure research.
    • Good point, why don't you just hop on over there and give us an update on the current situation? Don't forget to pack an extra sandwich for when you get hungry . . .
    • Aside from the fact that history tells us how we got here, we assume that the laws of the universe are not dependent on WHEN something occurs. So some physical event which took place hundreds of millions of years ago is no less important than what is happening now. Either way, we can only watch and learn.

    • If so, why spend all that money to find out what something looked at 24 million years ago (unless you're trying to identify the brown liquid lying at the bottom of my fridge)?

      I guess I don't understand why it'd be better if we were looking at a more recent picture of that galaxy. In the age of the Universe 24 million years isn't very long. Even when astronomers do look at very old (or young in terms of the age of the universe) galaxies it's still very interesting.

    • Re:24 million years ago? (Score:4, Interesting)

      by jsveiga (465473) on Wednesday October 26 2005, @07:02AM (#13879509)
      > looking at a picture of the light that left NGC891 24 million years ago. right? wrong?

      Wrong, due to the accelerating expansion of the universe. If the light of something out there 24 million light-years away hits us now, it doesn't mean that this light left the origin 24 million years before.

      It would be true if the universe was static.

      There was a VERY interesting article on Scientific American about common misconceptions about the big bang some months ago
      (stripped-down web version http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=0009F0C A-C523-1213-852383414B7F0147&pageNumber=5&catID=2 [sciam.com])
        explaining things like that.

  • Defn: (Score:3, Informative)

    by lurch84 (889236) on Tuesday October 25 2005, @11:41PM (#13878141)
    For those not in the know, "First Light" is when a telescope is first used to capture an image after construction.
    • Goodness, thank heavens you cracked that mind boggling enigma for us.
      • Call me what you like ;o) but I actually thought they had picked up the first visible light after the big bang on this telescope. So the definition put me straight!
  • That's no galaxy. Oh wait...
  • Is what's clear to me and the pictures seem to indicate that only one mirror is currently installed?

    • Re:Only one mirror? (Score:4, Informative)

      by dierdorf (37660) on Wednesday October 26 2005, @03:06AM (#13878889) Homepage
      > Is what's clear to me and the pictures seem to indicate that only one mirror is currently installed?

      Yes. The second mirror is still being polished and will be installed sometime next year.

      By the way, EACH mirror of the LBT is the largest single mirror in the world at 8.4 meter diameter. The Subaru telescope on Moana Kea is 8.2. There are larger telescope mirrors (Keck I and II, HET, and SALT), but they are segmented. Now that Arizona knows how to cast 8.4m mirrors, they are making the first of SEVEN of them for the next-generation Giant Magellen Telescope.

    • The second mirror cell and mirror were just installed about two weeks ago. You can see the second mirror if you look at the live webcams on www.lbto.org. However the second mirror is obviously not operational yet. It's scheduled to be aluminized in about six months.

  • squirrels (Score:3, Funny)

    by pease1 (134187) <bbunge@lad y a n d t r a m p . com> on Wednesday October 26 2005, @06:43AM (#13879446)
    Are the damn squirrels [arizona.edu] dead yet?

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