https://english.cas.cn/newsroom/cas_media/202205/t20220507_305162.shtmlThe launch of the Xuntian Space Telescope is scheduled for next year, as noted in this article. How do the intended capabilities of the Xuntian telescope compare with those of the Hubble Space Telescope and the James Webb Space Telescope?
The Sky Survey Optical Module , also known as the Sky Survey Space Telescope, is one of the components of China's Tiangong Space Station , but it will not be connected all the time, but will fly in co - orbital configuration with the main part of the Tiangong Space Station for a long time . It will also be China's first large-scale astronomical telescope set up in extraterrestrial space .
in 2015, a new sky survey plan was proposed, and it was decided to directly build a space telescope, which is known as the "Sky Survey" [4] . On the other hand, it is convenient to dock the space station for on-orbit maintenance, but the orbit is relatively low and the resistance is large. However, the on-orbit docking maintenance scheme of the sky survey module is more convenient than the Hubble telescope maintained by the space shuttle, and the maintenance cost is also much lower.
Quote from: Vahe231991 on 06/24/2022 02:54 pmhttps://english.cas.cn/newsroom/cas_media/202205/t20220507_305162.shtmlThe launch of the Xuntian Space Telescope is scheduled for next year, as noted in this article. How do the intended capabilities of the Xuntian telescope compare with those of the Hubble Space Telescope and the James Webb Space Telescope?The link is dead. Do you have a copy of the article maybe?
Quote from: leovinus on 06/27/2022 05:28 pmQuote from: Vahe231991 on 06/24/2022 02:54 pmhttps://english.cas.cn/newsroom/cas_media/202205/t20220507_305162.shtmlThe launch of the Xuntian Space Telescope is scheduled for next year, as noted in this article. How do the intended capabilities of the Xuntian telescope compare with those of the Hubble Space Telescope and the James Webb Space Telescope?The link is dead. Do you have a copy of the article maybe?The cited link isn't dead, it's active. There's a better link containing the same Xinhua article about the Xuntian Space Telescope:http://www.china.org.cn/china/Off_the_Wire/2022-05/05/content_78202185.htm
If it was hard-docket to the station, could vibration be an issue for observation? When it's near a station, wouldn't contamination be an issue? They took it very seriously during the Shuttle HST servicing missions.
I can't think of any other Chinese space telescopes and this seems over ambitious for a first project.
This is a very interesting, very capable and possibly overambitious project. The telescope has a 2m mirror, and appears to cover the uv-visible wavelength band. The sensors are quoted as being 81 megapixels (9000*9000 if square), which is larger than anything I have read about in US or European projects. It has a 2.5 gigapixel camera, and a field of view 300-350 times larger than Hubble.For comparison, the Roman space telescope 300 megapixel camera covering the visible to near-infrared (0.48-2.3 micron) band. Euclid has a 600 megapixel camera covering 550-920 nm, and a separate near-infrared camera. So the Chinese win on pixel count.The Chinese have a 1.1 square degree field of view versus a 0.28 square degree field of view for the Roman. The pixel scale appears to be 76 milliarcseconds versus 110 milliarcseconds on the Roman. They also have four more instruments. "Other four instruments mounted on the CSST are designed to observe individual objects or small fields, like mapping star-forming regions of the Milky Way, obtaining instantaneous color of fast varying objects such as comets and spinning asteroids, studying the co-evolution of supermassive black holes and galaxies and star formation in the nearby part of the universe, and direct imaging of exoplanets in the visible."I interpret that as meaning that they have a coronagraph, a medium resolution spectrometer and a few other things.The most interesting part of this project is the partnership with their manned program. Although it will normally operate as a free flyer, the telescope can dock with their space station for maintenance and upgrades. This allows China to evolve the capabilities of their space telescope over time by replacing the instruments. It will be very interesting to see how well that works.The bottom line is that this is an extremely capable machine on paper. It remains to be seen how good the execution will be. I can't think of any other Chinese space telescopes and this seems over ambitious for a first project. It must be very expensive. If it works it will be very capable at finding optical counterparts to gamma ray bursts and gravity wave events. It will also be good at searching for planet nine. If the Chinese find it, they get to name it.The Chinese space science program is well funded, has some original ideas, and seems to be aiming for parity with the US. I don't think many Americans realize that.
This is a very interesting, very capable and possibly overambitious project. The telescope has a 2m mirror, and appears to cover the uv-visible wavelength band. The sensors are quoted as being 81 megapixels (9000*9000 if square), which is larger than anything I have read about in US or European projects. It has a 2.5 gigapixel camera, and a field of view 300-350 times larger than Hubble.
