Liquid mirror telescopes

Liquid mirror telescopes are telescopes with mirrors made with a reflective liquid. The most common liquid used is mercury, but other liquids will work as well (for example, low melting alloys of gallium). The liquid and its container are rotated at a constant speed around a vertical axis, which causes the surface of the liquid to assume a paraboloidal shape, suitable for use as the primary mirror of a reflecting telescope. The rotating liquid assumes the paraboloidal shape regardless of the container's shape. To reduce the amount of liquid metal needed, and thus weight, a rotating mercury mirror uses a container that is as close to the necessary parabolic shape as possible. Liquid mirrors can be a low cost alternative to conventional large telescopes. Compared to a solid glass mirror that must be cast, ground, and polished, a rotating liquid metal mirror is much less expensive to manufacture.

Isaac Newton noted that the free surface of a rotating liquid forms a circular paraboloid and can therefore be used as a telescope, but he could not actually build one because he had no way to stabilize the speed of rotation. The concept was further developed by Ernesto Capocci of the Naples Observatory (1850), but it was not until 1872 that Henry Skey of Dunedin, New Zealand constructed the first working laboratory liquid mirror telescope.

Another difficulty is that a liquid metal mirror can only be used in zenith telescopes, i.e., that look straight up, so it is not suitable for investigations where the telescope must remain pointing at the same location of inertial space (a possible exception to this rule may exist for a mercury mirror space telescope, where the effect of Earth's gravity is replaced by artificial gravity, perhaps by rotating the telescope on a very long tether, or propelling it gently forward with rockets). Only a telescope located at the North Pole or South Pole would offer a relatively static view of the sky, although the freezing point of mercury and the remoteness of the location would need to be considered. A very large telescope already exists at the South Pole, but the North Pole is located in the Arctic Ocean.

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