The Search For Aliens Is About To Get More Intense
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The question of whether there is any form of life on other planets in our Universe has been plaguing humans for centuries - Now, the search is about to get even more intense, thanks to an ultra-large, uber-sophisticated telescope, innovatively dubbed - European Extremely Large Telescope or E-ELT!
Commissioned by the European Southern Observatory, a consortium of 15 European countries and Brazil, the telescope, which is expected to cost over $1.5 billion, is scheduled to be ready by 2020. While construction will not begin for at least a couple of years, scientists all over the world are currently vying for a chance to develop the sophisticated instruments that will be housed inside the dome-shaped structure, which amongst other things will feature a 40-meter (131 ft.) mirror put together from over 1,000 individual hexagonal segments.
The 'World's Biggest Eye On The Sky' will be built atop the 3,060 meters (10,000 ft.) high Cerro Amazones mountains that lie in the middle of Chile's Atacama Desert. The area, which also houses other powerful telescopes like the Paranal Observatory and the Atacama Large Military Array, is believed to be the ideal location for astronomical research because of its dry and arid climate.
When ready, the E-ELT will be ten times more sensitive to normal and infrared light than the Very Large Telescope that is currently in the Paranal Observatory — powerful enough to not only spot aliens but also, glean inside some of the oldest galaxies and help unlock secrets about how the Universe evolved to its current state.
Whether the 'World's Biggest Eye On The Sky' will be able to locate extraterrestrials is debatable — But, with the capability of taking pictures that are 15 times sharper than the Hubble Telescope, we are sure going to be the recipients of some amazing images of our Universe - So stay tuned!
Resources: Guardian.co.uk, esciencenews.com
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285 Comments
- princessabout 13 yearsi would love to buy one in 2020 i am 18 years old and if i work a lot for it i could get that telescope.its like 1.5 billion dallors. i think its the worlds biggest telescope ever to be made in the history of telescopes
- Jonathanabout 13 yearsi always wondered if aliens were real. i probably will find out. how cool it would be to see how actual aliens looked like!
- Ratabout 13 yearscool
kirbymasterabout 13 yearsI hope they find the galaxy farthest from the huge flaming ball in the center of the universe!!!!!!!!!!!!!! That is so cool!!!!!!!!!!!!! Like in star wars- cheneyneyabout 13 yearsi dont believe it
- nickabout 13 yearsWOW just wow
- Mister Chadabout 13 yearsI think they might or might not find aliens. I believe we don't need it right now because we dont need it to much. Cool but that is an awful lot of money put in to that telescope.
- mattabout 13 yearsThat is good that someoe built this. Cause I like to hear about aleins. that are pretty scary too.
- Tomabout 13 yearsIf they make that telescope and spend all that money for nothing that sucks for them. I hope they do find aliens so the whole thing about some people believing aliens and some not. I guess were gonna find out if its true that there are aleins.
- Jasmineabout 13 yearsThis was a really interesting article and a huge step in science for the world. I hope astronomers find something interesting and worth our money or all this cool equipment will go to waste. Maybe some of us will get to see a real life alien someday!