Telescopes: Keck Observatory and Hubble Space Telescope

Running Head: ASTRONOMY 1
Telescopes: Keck Observatory and Hubble Space Telescope
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ASTRONOMY 2
Introduction
The Keck Observatory consists of two telescopes, optical and infrared telescopes. Keck I
and Keck II telescopes measure 32.8 feet across and are housed in 700,000 cubic feet insulated
domes. The Keck Observatory is situated atop Mauna Kea, Waimea, Hawaii County, Hawaii,
USA. The size and location of the telescopes have made it highly demanded by professional
astronomers. The Keck observatory telescopes utilize the innovation where smaller mirror
segments can be operated as a single contiguous mirror (Howell, 2018). 36 hexagonal segments
make up each of the major mirrors of the Keck Observatory telescopes and the segments
function together as a single unit. Each of the two telescopes has been constructed to use
Altazimuth design type of mounting. The two telescopes use adaptive optics system, a
technology that reduces blurriness due to atmospheric distortion (W.M Keck Observatory, 2018).
The Keck telescopes change the shape of the mirror depending on the atmosphere changes. The
atmosphere changes rapidly and hence the telescopes need to adjust quickly to ammount for the
atmosphere changes. Both telescopes can change its mirror 2000 times every second, making the
clarity of the images to be ten times better than it would have been without the technology
(Space Telescope Science Institute, 2018). Also, Keck telescope utilizes a technique known as
interferometry, an innovation that allows the two telescopes to combine resulting in one huge
telescope providing extra viewing power (Colavita, Wizinowich, Akeson, & Wetherell, 2013).
Hubble Space Telescope is a space telescope and is the first major telescope to be placed
in space and has a length of 43.5 feet and a maximum diameter of 14 feet (NASA, 2018). Space
is an ultimate mountaintop since it is free of atmospheric distortion, light pollution, and has an
unobstructed universe view. Hubble space was launched and deployed in 1990 and since then
has made around 1.3 million observations. The telescope has 7.9 ft mirror observe invisible, near
ultraviolet and near-infrared spectra. Five servicing missions have been conducted since its
launch and deployment
1. Verify that the Keck telescopes are indeed approximately 2.8 million times better at collection
light than the human eye. Assume the diameter of the human eye is 6 mm. The area of a circle
is pr2, where r is the radius or diameter/2.
Answer:
Keck is 10m in diameter or 5 m in radius
The areas are pr2
And since p is same for the two then we just compare r2
For Keck;
r2= 5000^2 (mm) = 25000000mm^2