adaptive optics
Future Space Telescopes Could be Made From Thin Membranes, Unrolled in Space to Enormous Size
As we saw with JWST, it's difficult and expensive to launch large telescope apertures, relying on origami techniques to unfold…
Next Generation Space Telescopes Could Use Deformable Mirrors to Image Earth-Sized Worlds
NASA and its commercial partners are working on deformable mirrors (DM) that will allow next-generation telescopes to directly observe exoplanets.
It’s Already Hard Enough to Block a Single Star’s Light to See its Planets. But Binary Stars? Yikes
Detecting exoplanets was frontier science not long ago. But now we've found over 5,000 of them, and we expect to…
Ground-Based Lasers Could Push Space Debris off Collision-Course Orbits
Researchers at the Australian National University (ANU) are finding new uses for the laser-based technology that sharpens telescope imagery –…
A New Artist’s Illustration of the Extremely Large Telescope. So Many Lasers
Everyone loves lasers. And the only thing better than a bunch of lasers is a bunch of lasers on one…
The Carina Nebula. Seen With and Without Adaptive Optics
Ever wonder how modern astronomical observatories take such clear images of distant objects? Advances in mirror design have allowed for…
Astronomers Detect Water in the Atmosphere of a Planet 179 Light-Years Away
Gathering detailed information on exoplanets is extremely difficult. The light from their host star overwhelms the light from the exoplanet,…
This is a Photo of Neptune, From the Ground! ESO’s New Adaptive Optics Makes Ground Telescopes Ignore the Earth’s Atmosphere
Using advanced adaptive optics, the ESO's Very Large Telescope was able to capture pictures of Neptune, star clusters and other…
The Race To Image Exoplanets Heats Up!
Thanks to the deployment of the Kepler mission, thousands of extrasolar planet candidates have been discovered. Using a variety of…
Is Alpha Centauri The Best Place To Look For Aliens?
With all the attention Breakthrough Starshot has been getting some are wondering if Alpha Cantauri is the best place to…