The Space Telescope; NASA SP-392
Washington, DC: GPO, 1976. Presumed First Edition/First Printing. Wraps. xi, [1], 231, [1] pages. Wraps. Frontis illustration. Illustrations. Acronyms. Author index. Pencil erasure on half-title. This volume contains the author's summaries of their papers on the space telescope presented at the 21st annual meeting of the American Astronautical Society at Denver, Colorado, August 26-28, 1975. Space-based astronomy had begun on a very small scale following World War II, as scientists made use of developments that had taken place in rocket technology. The first ultraviolet spectrum of the Sun was obtained in 1946,[12] and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) launched the Orbiting Solar Observatory (OSO) to obtain UV, X-ray, and gamma-ray spectra in 1962. An orbiting solar telescope was launched in 1962 by the United Kingdom as part of the Ariel space program, and in 1966 NASA launched the first Orbiting Astronomical Observatory (OAO) mission. OAO-1's battery failed after three days, terminating the mission. It was followed by OAO-2, which carried out ultraviolet observations of stars and galaxies from its launch in 1968 until 1972, well beyond its original planned lifetime of one year. The OSO and OAO missions demonstrated the important role space-based observations could play in astronomy, and in 1968, NASA developed firm plans for a space-based reflecting telescope with a mirror 3 m in diameter, known provisionally as the Large Orbiting Telescope or Large Space Telescope (LST), with a launch slated for 1979. These plans emphasized the need for manned maintenance missions to the telescope to ensure such a costly program had a lengthy working life, and the concurrent development of plans for the reusable space shuttle indicated that the technology to allow this was soon to become available. Condition: good.
Keywords: Space Telescope, Orthicon, Thermostructural, Space Astronomy, Focal Plane Dynamic, NASA, Mission planning, telescope performance, optical detectors, mirror construction, pointing and control systems, data management, Scientific Instruments, Mission A
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