Telescopes - Astronomers Eyes on the Universe

Speaker: Lutz Haberzettl, University of Louisville

Abstract: Telescopes are astronomers' most important tools, their laboratory apparatus if you so will. With their invention in the early 17th century, telecopes allowed a closer and more detailed look into the Universe and helped to increase vastly our knwoledge and understanding of its formation and evolution. With each milestone in the development of telescope technology, astronomers were able to pierce more deeply into the outer regions of the Universe all the way back in time to the first generations of stars and galaxies. We will explore the history of telescope development from the first simple, small lensed tubes to the largest, highly complex systems under construction today. We will discover how new technology opened up different parts of the electromagnetic spectrum and allowed for a new understanding of astrophysical processes.