Work starts on building the world’s largest telescope
SANTIAGO Construction began in Chile yesterday on the European Extremely Large Telescope, which when completed will be the world’s largest optical telescope, some five times larger than the top instruments in use today.
The size of the ELT has the potential to transform our understanding of the universe, say its backers, with a main mirror that will be some 39 metres across.
Located on a 3000m mountain in the middle of the Atacama Desert, it is due to begin operating in 2024.
Among other capabilities, it will add to and refine astronomers’ burgeoning discoveries of planets orbiting other stars, with the ability to find more smaller planets, image larger ones, and possibly characterise their atmospheres, a key step in understanding if life is present.
‘‘What is being raised here is more than a telescope. Here we see one of the greatest examples of the possibilities of science,’’ Chilean President Michelle Bachelet said in a speech to mark the beginning of construction.
The dry atmosphere of the Atacama provides near-perfect observing conditions, with some 70 per cent of the world’s astronomical infrastructure slated to be located in the region by the 2020s.
The ELT is being funded by the European Southern Observatory, an organisation consisting of European and southern hemisphere nations.
Construction costs were not available but the organisation has said previously that the telescope would cost around 1 billion at 2012 prices. Reuters