Why Space Telescopes Will ALWAYS Be Superior to Earth Bound Telescopes.
Posted by DFM on February 19, 2022, 9:34 pm
So why bother with space telescopes anyway? The answer is that, no matter what we do with Earth bound telescopes, no matter how well we correct for atmospheric distortion, there remains an INSURMOUNTABLE problem with Earth bound telescopes: NOISE. Air scatters light, both from quantum scattering and from particulate scattering. This can NEVER be eliminated, or even reduced. Starlight from sources other than the intended target of an observation will scatter into the field of view during an observation. This necessarily lowers the signal to noise ratio, resulting in a dulling of the image, roughly equivalent to fogging of photographic film in the old days of chemical photography. Space telescopes have no atmospheric interference, and although there is some scattering due to space dust, etc, it is orders of magnitude smaller than atmospheric scattering. Hence, space telescopes will ALWAYS have superior signal-to-noise ratios, all other things being equal.
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- Why Space Telescopes Will ALWAYS Be Superior to Earth Bound Telescopes. - DFM February 19, 2022, 9:34 pm
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