Mirrors that are both lightweight and flexible could be compactly rolled up for the launch, and then accurately reshaped once they are deployed.
Scientists have developed a new method to produce and shape large, high-quality mirrors, significantly thinner than the primary mirrors traditionally employed in space telescopes. These resultant mirrors possess enough flexibility to be rolled up and packed efficiently within a spacecraft during launch.
“Launching and deploying space telescopes is a complicated and costly procedure,” said Sebastian Rabien from Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics in Germany. “This new approach — which is very different from typical mirror production and polishing procedures — could help solve weight and packaging issues for telescope mirrors, enabling much larger, and thus more sensitive, telescopes to be placed in orbit.”
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