Scientists to Search for Earth-Like Planets with World's Largest Telescope

[Buster's Uncle]

Scientists to Search for Earth-Like Planets with World's Largest Telescope
Entrepreneur  December 5, 2014 12:03 PM



It's been an exciting week for space exploration. Following news that NASA's Orion spacecraft launch was a success, the European Southern Observatory's (ESO) council announced that plans to build the world's largest telescope -- called the European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT) -- have been officially approved.

The telescope will be constructed at the top of Cerro Armazones, a mountain in Chile's Atacama Desert, which also home to the Cerro Armazones Observatory. The contracts for the work come to nearly $2.5 million.

The E-ELT is an aperture optical and infrared telescope with a surface of 128 feet (39 meters). ESO Director-General Tim de Zeeuw explained in a statement that the telescope's light-collecting surface will be able to help identify star populations in galaxies that are close to ours and planets that are similar in mass to Earth. 

The plans were approved in 2012, though the building could only begin when 90 percent of the funding came through, according to Space.com. The project is estimated to be completed in 2024, with "phase one" of the construction -- the telescope's main structure and dome -- starting in 2015.


http://news.yahoo.com/scientists-search-earth-planets-worlds-170300521.html

[Geo]

The telescope will be constructed at the top of Cerro Armazones, a mountain in Chile's Atacama Desert, which also home to the Cerro Armazones Observatory. The contracts for the work come to nearly $2.5 million.

That can't be right!

[Buster's Uncle]

-I thought the same thing.  I believe that's million with a B.

[Geo]

That's about a dollar for every moderately wealthy citizen on this planet.

[Buster's Uncle]

Moderately wealthy being never goes hungry and lives in a building with floors?

[Geo]

Moderately wealthy being never goes hungry and lives in a building with floors?

I'd at least add a roof to the building and the person's financial capability to purchase a car.

Are flats more expensive to live in then houses in the USA?

[Buster's Uncle]

They are everywhere, in the long run, aren't they?

[Geo]

What is everywhere?

[Buster's Uncle]

Renting being poor long-term strategy.

[Geo]

Guess I'm poor then.

[Buster's Uncle]

Spent it all on travel - you gotta start putting some in savings.

[Geo]

You seem to have forgotten my comment on that article about how much a wrongly-jailed aussie received in damages by his country.

[Buster's Uncle]

Yeah.

I don't know what you're talking about.