Michelson_stellar_interferometer

Michelson stellar interferometer

Michelson stellar interferometer

Type of array used for astronomical observations

The Michelson stellar interferometer is one of the earliest astronomical interferometers built and used. The interferometer was proposed by Albert A. Michelson in 1890, following a suggestion by Hippolyte Fizeau.

Scheme of the Michelson stellar interferometer
A 20-foot (~6 meters) Michelson interferometer mounted on the frame of the 100-inch (~250 cm) Hooker Telescope, 1920.

The first such interferometer built was at the Mount Wilson observatory, making use of its 100-inch (~250 centimeters) mirror. It was used to make the first-ever measurement of a stellar diameter, by Michelson and Francis G. Pease, when the diameter of Betelgeuse was measured in December 1920. The diameter was found to be 240 million miles (~380 million kilometers), about the size of the orbit of Mars, or about 300 times larger than the Sun.

See also

References

  • Michelson, A. A., and Pease, F. G. (1921). Astrophys. J. 53, 249–259.
Stub icon

This optics-related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.
Share this article:

This article uses material from the Wikipedia article Michelson_stellar_interferometer, and is written by contributors. Text is available under a CC BY-SA 4.0 International License; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.