Friday, October 06, 2006

Keppler's Astronomical Telescope

We can only thank Galileo Galilei for his invention of the first astronomical telescope which is the refracting telescope or what is called the Galileo telescope. His refractor was an improvement of the first refractor discovered by a Dutch optician, Hans Lippershey. The fact is, the Galileo Telescope can be considered as one of the most important discoveries and inventions in the field of astronomy.

But in the year 1611, it was the turn of Galileo Galilei’s refracting telescope to become a model to a more improved scope, the Keplerian Telescope, which as invented by the German scientist and astronomer Johannes Kepler.

Johannes Keppler, who is one of Tycho’s outstanding students, used a special type of lenses instead of optical mirrors for the reason that during his time such quality mirrors are not yet available.

The telescope’s convergent mirrors were the trend during Keppler’s time until they were taken over by larger mirrors that were built to capture low intensity objects.

Some more information on Johannes Keppler – Aside from being a scientist and astronomer, he was also a gifted mathematician, a prolific writer of science fiction and an astrologer. He was often referred to by many, especially by as peers, as the world’s last scientific astrologer.

No comments: