Giant Magellan Telescope
@giantmagellan
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World’s most powerful telescope designed to discover the unknown. The Universe Awaits™
Chile
Joined May 2011
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The four-year process to fabricate and polish our seventh and final mirror has begun at the
@uarizona
Richard F. Caris Mirror Lab.
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OHB Italia S.p.A has finished manufacturing and testing the first of seven mirror covers for the Giant Magellan Telescope. In just over two minutes, the covers will deploy and retract in unison to protect the world’s largest mirrors when they’re not in use.
Video credit: OHB
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Congratulations to our Community Science Meeting social media contest winner,
@import_robs
! Prize recipient of a piece of the glass used to make the Giant Magellan Telescope’s sixth mirror segment.
#GiantMagellan2022
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At the southern edge of Chile’s Atacama Desert sits our future window into the universe. Construction of the Giant Magellan Telescope is underway at Las Campanas Peak.
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Casting of the sixth Giant Magellan Telescope mirror segment is underway! Last week, the
@uarizona
Richard F. Caris Mirror Lab team conducted inspection, carefully selecting 3,500 pieces of the borosilicate glass. Technicians then loaded nearly 20 tons of it into the furnace.
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We celebrate the life of astronomer João E. Steiner, who passed away earlier today. Dr. Steiner made remarkable scientific contributions to the Brazilian & international astronomical communities. His leadership & friendship at GMT representing
@AgenciaFAPESP
will be missed.
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The
@uarizona
Richard F. Caris Mirror Lab has closed the lid on nearly 20 tons of glass inside a one-of-a-kind oven to create the world’s largest optics.
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Our final mirror has officially reached high fire (when the glass heats to 2129 degrees Fahrenheit – the temperature of flowing lava) at the
@uarizona
Richard F. Caris Mirror Lab.
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Today, we welcome
@WeizmannScience
into the international consortium building the Giant Magellan Telescope. Together, we will explore new clues to the evolution of the universe and origins of life. Read more:
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Today,
@UTAustin
announced an additional $45 million commitment for constructing the Giant Magellan Telescope. “This significant investment will advance the future of astronomy and expand Texas observing access for generations to come.” – Giant Magellan President, Robert Shelton
On this birthday for McDonald Observatory, it is fitting that the
@utsystem
Board of Regents authorized an add’l $45m commitment for
@UTAustin
’s investment in the Giant Magellan Telescope. This incredible project will deeply impact our understanding of the universe!
@TexasScience
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The US Extremely Large Telescope Program was ranked as the top frontier project for ground-based observatories by the
#Astro2020
Decadal Survey. Read how the Giant Magellan Telescope will contribute to the program’s bold vision:
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Our seventh mirror is in the making at the
@uarizona
Richard F. Caris Mirror Lab, the last required to complete the set.
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#GMTO
has signed its largest ever contract with MT Mechatronics and Ingersoll Machine Tools for the design, construction & installation of the telescope’s precision steel structure.
#BuildingGMT
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The Giant Magellan Telescope will enable astronomers to measure the smallest and faintest galaxies ever observed, revealing the internal workings of galaxies across the entirety of cosmic history. The universe awaits.
Credit: ESO
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Thanks to this technology, the optical clarity in next generation ground-based telescopes will surpass even that of space telescopes:
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The Giant Magellan Telescope has received a major
@NSF
grant to accelerate the development of some of the most powerful optical technologies ever engineered. The advancements will transform humanity’s view of the universe.
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We are excited to announce that we have initiated the fifth of seven mirrors that will form the heart of the
#GMTelescope
. Read more this exciting milestone in the link.
#BuildingGMT
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The Giant Magellan Telescope has secured a $205 million investment from its international consortium to accelerate construction. Marking one of the largest investments in project history, this is how it will be used:
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Thank you for following our eclipse journey! Enjoy these images captured at the GMT and
@CarnegieAstro
event by GMTO engineer Paul Gardner during totality: the diamond ring, the Sun's corona, and Baily's Beads.
#totalsolareclipse
#EclipseSolar2019
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The entire 2,100 ton mass of the Giant Magellan Telescope will track celestial objects across the sky while floating on a film of oil merely 50 microns thick, 25 times smaller than a grain of sand, allowing the mirrors to move without friction.
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17,500 kg of glass has been placed in preparation for the
#GMTelescope
5th mirror casting at the
@UofA
Richard F. Caris Mirror Lab.
#BuildingGMT
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Under construction on Las Campanas Peak in Chile’s Atacama Desert, the Giant Magellan will provide astronomers with direct observation of many celestial objects of scientific interest in the southern hemisphere.
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Recently, the Giant Magellan Telescope’s penultimate mirror was lifted off the furnace floor at the
@uarizona
Richard F. Caris Mirror Lab.
Image Credit: Damien Jemison
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Ready to ring in the
#NewYear
? Welcoming 2023 from the southern edge of Chile’s Atacama Desert — The Universe Awaits. 🔭✨
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Last week, the mirror lab team opened the furnace under the
@uarizona
football field, unveiling our sixth mirror. The mirror began its casting process in the spring and has been annealing over the last few months.
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The US Extremely Large Telescope Program is grateful for the
#Astro2020
Decadal Survey. Our vision is to provide all-sky coverage to US-based astronomers. We are reviewing the recommendations in detail and will issue a statement soon. Learn more:
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An image of the
#GMTelescope
5th mirror as it's lifted from the furnace floor by a crane attached to the lifting fixture on the mirror's front surface. [Image: Damien Jemison, GMTO]
#BuildingGMT
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At the
#GMTelescope
site, Sept. 4: Work has started on the “outer grade beam” which delimits the boundary of the enclosure. White lines for the beam are drawn and boundary drilling is taking place. At the pier, excavation continues and trucks can be seen removing loads of rock.
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At 2,106 tons, the Giant Magellan Telescope will float on a film of oil just 50 microns thick, half as thick as a single sheet of paper. This allows for the mirrors to move without friction as they track celestial objects across the sky.
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Join us next month in Sedona, Arizona, for the Giant Magellan Telescope’s 8th Annual Community Science Meeting. This year, we’ll be focusing on black holes at all scales. Register here:
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The first image of the sunlit side of Earth taken by the
#DSCOVR
spacecraft
http://t.co/wwXUzeTSfm
@SPACEdotcom
http://t.co/mGiZhD6uqp
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A view of the
#GMTelescope
site, Oct. 2: Now that edge drilling is complete, excavation begins at the pier lift platform pit. A hydraulic hammer can be seen breaking up the rock before it is removed.
#BuildingGMT
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In 1967, trailblazing astrophysicist Jocelyn Bell Burnell helped shape our understanding of the universe. She provided the first direct evidence of pulsars (magnetized rotating neutron stars), one of the most significant scientific achievements of the 20th century.
#WomenInSTEM
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Here's a timelapse video from the
#GMT
site, January 21: Excavation work is nearly now complete with about 450 dump truck loads of material removed from the summit.
#BuildingGMT
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More light + better resolution = more sensitivity. Our Chief Scientist and astronomer
@carnegiescience
, Rebecca Bernstein, is describing the engineering and all the amazing capabilities of the Giant Magellan Telescope!
#GMTelescope
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It takes more than four years to produce a Giant Magellan Telescope mirror from start to finish. Our third mirror segment has achieved 200 nanometer accuracy and is now less than one year from completion. Mirror polishing continues at the
@uarizona
Richard F. Caris Mirror Lab.
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Here’s a close-up look of the glass laid in preparation for the
#GMTelescope
's 5th mirror casting at the
@UofA
Richard F. Caris Mirror Lab. It takes nearly 20 tons of Ohara E6 Low Expansion glass to make a single GMT primary mirror segment.
#BuildingGMT
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At the
#GMTelescope
site, Oct. 2: Excavation of the telescope pier's center is underway, while boundary drilling continues in the utility tunnel area. The enclosure outer ring-wall grade beam is a little beyond half finished.
#BuildingGMT
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The Giant Magellan Telescope will see into the universe with unprecedented detail using seven of the world’s largest mirrors. Marking a major step toward its completion, engineers are casting its penultimate mirror.
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This recent drone aerial photo of the
#GMTelescope
site show ellipses on the ground, representing the shadow of the GMT mirror array. [Photo Credit: Ciel et Espace]
#LifeatLCO
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This is the spinning oven! 19 tons of glass is loaded then heated up to about 2100°F. As the glass starts to liquefy, the oven starts to spin & the glass flows into the empty spaces in the mold and takes on a parabolic shape.
#BuildingGMT
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The Giant Magellan’s primary mirrors are the world’s largest and most challenging optics ever produced. The primary mirrors are the telescope’s first contact surface that collects incoming light from the night sky. 🧵
#engineering
#design
#technology
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Using 160 tons of glass, we are creating the world's largest mirrors for the Giant Magellan Telescope. With each mirror weighing as much as a school bus, seven giant light buckets will combine to form a single optical surface allowing for unprecedented light gathering ability.
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Weighing over 1,000 tons, the telescope structure (known as the mount) will stand on a pier that is 22 meters in diameter and will be very stiff to minimize focal plane image motion under a wide range of observing conditions.
#TelescopeTuesday
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The Giant Magellan Telescope site was swept with a rare winter storm earlier this month. Our site operations team is in good spirits and has done an extraordinary job enduring the harsh conditions for the site to remain operational.
📷 Francisco Figueroa
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Excavation is underway for the
#GMTelescope
! Over the next 5 months, ~13,300 tons of rock will be removed from the site at
@CarnegieAstro
’s Las Campanas Observatory in Chile.
Read more details:
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Check out the latest design of the
#GMT
enclosure, telescope, and site at Las Campanas Observatory in Chile! M3 Engineering created the enclosure design and animation.
#ScienceFriday
#BuildingGMT
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Here are top views of the
#GMTelescope
Mirror 5, which has recently been removed from the furnace at the
@UofA
Richard F. Caris Mirror Lab.
#BuildingGMT
[Photo Credit: Damien Jemison, GMTO]
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Celebrating Chilean astrophysicist Carmen Adelina Gutiérrez Alonso today. As a luminary ambassador of the southern night sky, she was the first Chilean to earn a doctorate in astrophysics and the first woman to become a member of the Chilean Academy of Sciences.
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Recent view of the Giant Magellan Telescope summit – the hard rock has been excavated for the telescope pier and enclosure.
📸 Francisco Tapia
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Today marks the shortest day in the Northern Hemisphere and the longest in the Southern Hemisphere. Happy December solstice!
Credit: NASA/Genna Duberstein
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Here's a close-up look at the rear surface polishing for
#GMTelescope
mirror 4 at the
@UofA
Richard F. Caris Mirror Lab (captured in Feb. 2018). Similar to GMT mirror 2, cerium oxide material is used.
#BuildingGMT
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A view of the
#GMTelescope
site, Oct. 9: This was a busy day on site! A small pit (for an elevator) started excavation and edge drilling begins on the opposite side of the outer grade beam. On this day, a total of 184 dump truck loads were excavated and removed.
#BuildingGMT
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A view of the
#GMTelescope
site, Oct. 18: Work is taking place on all parts of the site excavation. Dump trucks take away material (201 loads to date), and hydraulic hammers work on the utility tunnel, outer grade beam and the pier lift platform.
#BuildingGMT
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Earlier this month, the furnace lid lifted off
#GMTelescope
Mirror 5 after a three-month cooling period.
Here's a picture of Randy Lutz (Mirror Casting Manager,
@UofA
Richard F. Caris Mirror Lab) and team removing part of the furnace wall to access the mirror.
#BuildingGMT
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From studying planet atmospheres in the search for life to studying the first generations of galaxies, we are on a mission of discovery. What science are you looking forward to seeing conducted with the
#GiantMagellan
?
#AAS241
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Using precision spectroscopy, astronomers will explore the chemical compositions of diverse worlds. From a rocky surface to a reflective ocean, the Giant Magellan Telescope aims to reveal whether an exoplanet is truly Earth-like.
Credit: NASA Goddard Conceptual Image Lab
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A view of the
#GMTelescope
site, January 11: The excavation work is nearly complete. Key features are the pier lift platform pit at the center, surrounding it is the telescope pier footing and the inner grade beam.
#BuildingGMT
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#OTD
in 1967, trailblazing astrophysicist
#JocelynBellBurnell
helped shape our understanding of the universe by providing the first direct evidence of pulsars, aka rotating neutron stars, marking one of the most significant scientific achievements of the 20th century.
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Join us this Saturday afternoon for Pasadena’s AstroFest 2022! This community event will have family-friendly activities, interactive VR demos, gravity-wells, self-guided solar system tours, solar telescopes, and more.
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Congratulations to GMTO Board Member and Professor of Astronomy at the University of Sao Paulo, Prof. Claudia Mendes de Oliveira on her election to the Brazilian Academy of Sciences.
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With the
#GMTelescope
mirror 5 turned vertically on its side, it is then ready for the bolts and the refractory material to be cleaned out.
Captured in early April 2018 at the
@UofA
Richard F. Caris Mirror Lab [Image: Damien Jemison, GMTO]
#BuildingGMT
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The last solar eclipse of the year is taking place tomorrow – a total solar eclipse that will sweep across Antarctica. Partial phases can be seen from the southernmost tips of South America, Africa, Australia and New Zealand.
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The Giant Magellan will study habitable planets to determine whether molecules in the atmosphere of a distant planet are created by life. Learn more about these life-finding technologies:
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Taking in the view from the Giant Magellan Telescope site in Chile's Atacama Desert.
📸 Francisco Tapia
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Henrietta Swan Leavitt's discovery in 1912 of the relationship between the period and the brightness variability of certain variable stars known as Cepheids led to the first measurement of distances of stars in the Andromeda galaxy.
#womeninSTEM
#InternationalWomensMonth
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A group of astronomers have taken the first photograph of a planet being formed around a young dwarf star. This is the first time they've actually been able to detect a separate
#babyplanet
.
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Beneath the
@uarizona
football stadium, the world's largest mirrors are made. Casting the Giant Magellan Telescope's sixth mirror marks a major step towards completing one of the most anticipated extremely large telescopes.
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Check out the drone view of the
#GMTelescope
summit showing the excavations of the foundations of the telescope pier and enclosure, as well as progress on the water tank (below right).
#BuildingGMT
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"The oven's present pastry is the seventh and final mirror of the Giant Magellan Telescope," read more from
@SPACEdotcom
:
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With the Giant Magellan Telescope's unique design, seven mirrors will align to a fraction of wavelength to work in unison as one coherent surface. Light reflected off the mirror edges is dispersed allowing for certainty in the telescope's alignment at all wavelengths.
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Check out the work in progress on both the primary mirror coating chamber pit (foreground) and telescope pier (background) at the
#GMTelescope
construction site in mid-August.
#BuildingGMT
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The telescope mount provides the supporting framework for the Giant Magellan’s mirrors, adaptive optics, scientific instruments, and control systems.
#engineering
#design
#technology
#manufacturing
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Once completed, the
#GMTelescope
will be nearly 700x larger than Galileo’s first refractor. The GMT will use 7 giant mirrors, each 8.4m in diameter, to create an optical surface 25 meters in diameter, allowing astronomers to observe the universe in great detail.
#TelescopeTuesday
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Look inside the Giant Magellan’s primary mirror support system – the complex process of transforming collected light into science begins here, in the support system that protects these giant mirrors.
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Thank you
@SPACEdotcom
for including our infographic!
http://t.co/Dsfyc7uxR1
#Lyrids
#MeteorShower
http://t.co/Wmrol1txAh
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Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin was the first person to earn a PhD in astronomy from Radcliffe College (now Harvard) and later became Chair of the Harvard Astronomy Dept. Her 1925 thesis proposed that stars were made from hydrogen and helium, contrary to theory at the time.
#WomenInSTEM
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At the
#GMTelescope
construction site on August 27th: The team checks out progress on the excavation for the telescope pier when the hole was approximately 20 meters in diameter.
#BuildingGMT
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Did you know the
#GMTelescope
will take the first cutting-edge images of the Universe where stars are seen exactly as they actually are: without diffraction spikes?
Read more via
@Forbes
by
@StartsWithABang
:
#WhoaScience
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#GMTelescope
's 1st giant mirror segment has started its journey south! Check out details of the moving process here:
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April is Global Astronomy Month and this year,
@awb_org
is celebrating the moon! We'll celebrate by sharing weekly moon facts throughout April.
Read more about this year's theme and festivities via
@SkyandTelescope
:
#GAM2018
#FlyMeToTheMoon
@GAM_AWB
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At 2,106 tons, the Giant Magellan Telescope will float on a film of oil just 50 microns thick, half as thick as a single sheet of paper. This allows for the mirrors to move without friction as they track celestial objects across the sky,
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A significant milestone for
#GMT
’s primary mirror controls team recently took place at the
@azstewobs
Richard F. Caris Mirror Lab – the bringing together of the mirror simulator, the prototype mirror cell, and the test cell. Learn more here:
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After the four month casting procedure for this fourth mirror, the oven lid is lifted, revealing a perfect casting!
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Sally Ride became America's 1st Woman in Space in 1983 MT
@SPACEdotcom
http://t.co/o2q3gmgY8Q
http://t.co/DpL0ANuqC9
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A bigger telescope and larger aperture equates to more light and higher resolution. We are building the Giant Magellan Telescope to see farther away and observe fainter objects from the ground than ever before.
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Popular Mechanics has featured the
#GMTelescope
as part of their "Monster Machines Week" dedicated to the biggest, most ambitious mechanical marvels anybody has conceived.
Check out the article via
@PopMech
by
@jaybenn91
:
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We're in Washington, DC, kicking off day one of the
#GiantMagellan2023
Community Science Meeting on
#exoplanets
with an overview of the Giant Magellan Telescope from Chief Scientist Rebecca Bernstein.
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The removal of the furnace lid (“cone”) for the
#GMTelescope
’s mirror segment 5 took place last week at the
@UofA
's Richard F. Caris Mirror Lab.
#BuildingGMT
[Photo credit: Damien Jemison, GMTO]
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The Giant Magellan Telescope’s sensitivity, resolution, and spectroscopic capabilities make understanding the origins of a wide range of planetary systems possible. Astronomers will compare our solar system to its neighbors looking for alien worlds like we never imagined.
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Full moon from the Giant Magellan Telescope site in Chile's Atacama Desert.
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That's a wrap on our 9th Annual Community Science Meeting. Experts from universities and research institutions across the globe met to discuss
#exoplanets
, motivating the future direction for research in the era of extremely large telescopes.
#GiantMagellan2023
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From here, we'll look up to the cosmos for signs of distant life. Having removed 13,000 metric tonnes of rock,
@wsp
continues progress alongside our team in the Giant Magellan Telescope's observatory construction.
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The
#GMT
mirror “blank” is formed by melting glass into a mold formed by high-temperature resistant refractory material, consisting of a silicon carbide cement tub and filled with about 1,700 alumina-silica fiber hexagonal boxes that form a honeycomb structure.
#TelescopeTuesday
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#NewsAlert
: Arizona State University joins the Giant Magellan Telescope Organization to build the world's largest telescope. Welcome aboard,
@ASU
!
#GMTelescope
#theedgeofexploration
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