answersLogoWhite

0

Exactly the same way that an optical telescope gathers waves with wavelngths

shorter than radio waves:

Both the mirror of a reflecting telescope and the 'dish' of a radio telescope are

built to have the shape of a 'paraboloid' ... that's the solid shape you get when

you spin a parabola around its nose.

The paraboloid has the interesting geometric property that anything that comes

straight in, parallel to its axis ... whether it's bees, bullets, B-Bs, or electromagnetic

waves ... and bounces off the inside of the curve, all winds up at the same point,

called the "focus" of the paraboloid.

-- The focus is where the film, or the eyepiece, the CCD, or the spectrometer

of the reflecting telescope is placed. All the light that hits the whole mirror is

concentrated onto it.

-- The focus is where the radio receiver of the radio telescope is placed.

All the radio waves that hit the entire dish are concentrated onto it.

-- The focus is where the little LNB on the end of the arm that sticks out in front

of the TV dish on your neighbor's garage is placed. All the microwave waves

from the TV satellite that hit the entire dish are concentrated onto it.

User Avatar

Wiki User

13y ago

What else can I help you with?

Continue Learning about Music & Radio

A device used to detect radio waves from space?

they use radio waves to pick up some what satellite images or existance of things in space


What instrument used to gather information by bouncing radio waves off their surface?

the instrument used to gather radio waves is a special dish called a parabolic dish


Why doesnt the surface of a radio telescope have to be as flawless as the surface of a mirror in an optical telescope?

The surface of a radio telescope doesn't have to be as flawless as the surface of an optical telescope because the radio telescope is collecting radio waves, something that will not be affected by faults in the glass. Optical telescopes, on the other hand, are collecting light, where faults in the surface can interfere with the image.


How is a radio telescope different from both a refracting and a reflecting telescope?

Well, its simple, there are two things that are in common.... both telescopes have a eye peice and a radio telescope doesnt.... theres more to it and the radio telescope looks way diffrent then the regular ones..... Wow! What a non-answer this person has given! For one thing, radio telescopes look more like satellite dishes than traditional telescopes. Rather than operating on the visible light spectrum as a reflecting or refracting telescope would, radio telescopes gather information from the infrared light spectrum - radiation waves. These radiation waves are collected to form a picture of whatever the radio telescope is looking at. I'm not a scientist; I'm not an astronomy student. I just did a little bit of research that the original answerer obviously didn't do.


Is the image produced by a radio telescope the same as the image produced by a optical telescope?

no you cant see image its appers in waves