How Do People Study The Solar System?
Telescopes
Imagine looking up at the sky on a clear night. You can see thousands of stars shining in the sky. Do you sometimes wish you could see them more clearly?
One way we can study the objects in the sky is with telescopes.
A telescope (Fr. le télescope) is an instrument people use to observe distant objects. It magnifies objects so that they are easier for us to see.
There are different types of telescopes:
- Radio telescopes use radio waves in order to produce an image.
- Optical telescope - There are two main kinds of optical telescopes:
1. Reflecting telescopes use curved mirrors to magnify objects.
2. Refracting telescopes use lenses (like in eyeglasses) to magnify objects. The first refracting telescope was built in 1609 by Galileo Galilei. Galileo could see mountains on the moon, four of Jupiter’s moons, Saturn’s rings, and sunspots.
Today, most research telescopes use computers and television systems to create the pictures of space we see. The Hubble Space Telescope (a reflecting telescope) was sent into space in 1990 and has provided us with millions of images of the universe. The Hubble Space Telescope has an advantage over land-based telescopes. Because it is located in space, the pictures it produces are not affected by Earth’s atmosphere. This means the pictures are brighter and clearer.
