This chapter provides a general overview of optical telescope history, astronomical requirements, optical aberrations, optical telescope system design, and modern optical theory. In this chapter, important optical concepts such as angular resolution, light collecting power, field of view, telescope efficiency, atmospheric seeing, geometrical aberrations, wavefront error, ray tracing, merit function, optical and modulation transfer function, point spread function, Strehl ratio, and imaging spatial frequency are introduced. The concept discussions are arranged in a systematic way so that readers can learn step-by-step. The chapter provides many important formulas of optical system design and evaluation. Emphases are placed on both the traditional geometric aberrational theory and the modern optical theory. At the end of the chapter, image properties of a segmented mirror system are also discussed in detail.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Anderson, G. and Tullson, D., 2006, Photon sieve telescope, SPIE Proc., 6265, 626523.
Bahner, K., 1968, Large and very large telescope projects and consideration, ESO Bulletin, No. 5.
Barlow, B. V., 1975, The astronomical telescope, Wykeham Publications (London) Ltd, London.
Baum, W. A., 1962, The detection and measurement of faint astronomical sources, in Astronomical techniques, ed. Hiltner, WA,, Astronomical Techniques, Chicago.
Born, M. and Wolf, E., 1980, Principles of optics, 6th ed. Pergamon Press, Oxford.
Bowen, I. S., 1964, Telescopes, AJ, 69, 816.
Cao, C., 1986, Optical system for large field telescopes, Conference on large field telescope design, Nanjing Astronomical Instrument Institute, Nanjing.
Cheng, J., 1988, Field of view, star guiding and general design of large Schmidt telescope, Proceedings of ESO conference on VLT and their instruments, Munich, Germany.
Cheng, J. and Liang, M., 1990, High image quality Mersenne-Schmidt telescope, SPIE Proc. Adv. Technol. Telescope (IV), 1236, p243–249.
Dalrymple, N. E., 2002, Mirror seeing, ATST project CDR report #0003, NOAO.
Dawe, J. A., 1984, The determination of the vignetting function of a Schmidt telescope, in Astronomy with Schmidt telescopes, ed. Capaccioli, M, E. Reidel Pub. Co., Dordrecht.
Dierickx, P., et al., 2004, OWL phase A, status report, Proc. SPIE, 5489, 391.
Disney, M. J., 1972, Optical arrays, Mon. Not. RAS., 160, 213–232.
Disney, M. J., 1978, Optical telescope of the future, ESO Conf. Proc. 23, 145–163.
Emerson, D., 2005, Lecture notes of NRAO summer school on radio interferometry, National radio astronomy observatory.
Foy, R. and Labeyrie, A., 1985, Feasibility of adaptive telescope with laser probe, Astron. Astrophys., 152, L29.
Gascoigne, C. S. R., 1968, Some recent advances in the optics of large telescopes, Quart. J. RAS., 9, 18.
Gascoigne, C. S. R., 1973, Recent advances in astronomical optics, Appl. Opt., 12, 1419.
Glassner, A. S., 1989, An introduction to ray tracing, Academic Press, London.
Gramham Smith, F., and Thompson, J. H., 1988, Optics, 2nd edition, John Wiley & Sons Ltd., New York.
Hecht, H. and Zajac, A., 1974, Optics, Addison-Wesley Pub. Co, London.
Jiang, S. 1986, Review of multi-object spectroscope, Conference on large field telescope, Nanjing Astronomical Instrument Institute, Nanjing.
Kraus, J. D., 1986, Radio astronomy, Cygnus-Quasar Books, Powell, Ohio.
Learner, R., 1980, Astronomy through the telescope, Evans Brothers, London.
Liang, M., et al., 2005, The LSST optical system, Bull. Am. Astron. Soc., 37, 2005.
Lo, A. S. and Arenberg, J., 2006, New architectures for space astronomical telescopes using Fresnel optics, SPIE Proc., 6265, 626522.
Pawsey, J. L., Payne-Scott, R. and McCready, L. L., 1946, Radio frequency energy from the sun, Nature, 157, 158.
Racine, R., 1984, Astronomical seeing at Mauna Kea and in particular at the CFHT, IAU Colloq. No. 79, 235.
Reynolds, G. O., et al., 1989, The new physical optics notebook: tutorials in Fourier optics, SPIE Press,
Roddier, F., 1979, Effect of atmosphere turbulence on the formation of infrared and visible images, J. of optics, 10, 299–303.
Roddier, F., 1984, Measuring atmospheric seeing, in IAU Colloq. No. 79, eds. Ulrich MH and Kjar K, Garching bei Munchen, Germany.
Schnapf, J. L. and Baylor, D. A., 1987, How photoreceptor cells respond to light, Sci. Am., 256, 40–47.
Schroeder, D. J., 2000, Astronomical optics, Academic Press, San Diego.
Shao, L.-Z. and Su, D.-Q., 1983, Improvement of chromatic aberration of an aspherical plate corrector for prime focus, Opt. Acta, 30, 1267–1272.
Slyusarev, G. G., 1984, Aberration and optical design theory, 2nd ed. Adam Hilger Ltd., Bristol.
Steward, E. G., 1983, Fourier optics: an introduction, Ellis Horwood Limited, Chichester.
Stoltzmann, D. E., 1983, Resolution criteria for diffraction-limited telescopes, Sky Telescope, 65, 176–181.
Su, D.-Q., 1963, Discussion on corrector design for reflecting telescope system, Acta Astron, 11.
Su, D.-Q., et al., 1967, Automatic design of corrector system for Cassegrain telescopes, Acta Astron, 17.
Su, D.-Q. and Wang, Y.-L., 1974, Optimization of aberrations for astronomical optical system, Acta Astron, 15.
Su, D.-Q. and Wang, L.-J., 1982, A flat-field reflecting focal reducer, Opt. Acta, 29, 391–394.
Su, D.-Q., et al., 1983, Spot diagram and lest square optimization, Nanjing Astronomical Instrument Institute, Nanjing.
Vernin, J., 1986, Astronomical site selection, a new meteorological approach, SPIE Proc., 628, 142.
Wetherell, W. B., 1974, Image quality criteria for the Large Space Telescope, in Space optics, eds. Thompson B. J. and Shannon R. R., National Academy of Science, Washington.
Wetherell, W. B., 1980, The calculation of image quality, in Applied optics and optical engineering, Vol. 8, Academic Press, New York.
Willstroop, R. V., 1984, The Mersenne-Schmidt telescope, in IAU Colloq. No. 79, eds. Ulrich M. H. and Kjar K., Garching bei Munchen, Germany.
Wilson, R. N, 1968, Corrector systems for Cassegrain telescopes, Appl. Opt., 7, 253–263.
Wilson, R. N, 2004, Reflecting telescope optics I, 2nd ed. Springer, Berlin.
Wynne, C. G., 1967, Afocal correctors for Paraboloidal mirrors, Appl. Opt., 6, 1227–1231.
Yaitskova, N., et al., 2003, Analytical study of diffraction effects in extremely large segmented telescopes, J. Opt. Soc. Am. A, 20, 1563–1575.
Yi, M., 1982, Design of aspherical correctors for Cassegrain system, Acta Astron., 23, 398.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2009 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Cheng, J. (2009). Fundamentals of Optical Telescopes. In: The Principles of Astronomical Telescope Design. Astrophysics and Space Science Library, vol 360. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/b105475_1
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/b105475_1
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, New York, NY
Print ISBN: 978-0-387-88790-6
Online ISBN: 978-0-387-88791-3
eBook Packages: Physics and AstronomyPhysics and Astronomy (R0)