Schmidt telescope

American  

noun

1. a wide-angle reflecting telescope used primarily for astronomical photography, in which spherical aberration and coma are reduced to a minimum by means of a spherical mirror with a corrector plate near its focus.

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Schmidt telescope British  

noun

1. a catadioptric telescope designed to produce a very sharp image of a large area of sky in one photographic exposure. It incorporates a thin specially shaped glass plate at the centre of curvature of a short-focus spherical primary mirror so that the resulting image, which is focused on a photographic plate, is free from spherical aberration, coma, and astigmatism

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Etymology

Origin of Schmidt telescope

1935–40; named after Bernard Schmidt (1879–1935), German inventor

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

Schmidt telescope

An amateur astronomer since he was a teenager, Voigt realized the scallop’s eye design resembled a kind of telescope invented nearly 100 years ago called the Schmidt telescope.

From Science Magazine ● Apr. 13, 2023

Initially, it was inspected from two ground observatories in Australia, first the UK Schmidt telescope and later the Anglo-Australian telescope.

From New York Times ● Aug. 4, 2022

Fritz Zwicky at the Schmidt telescope at Palomar Observatory, California, in the 1930s.Credit:

From Nature ● Sep. 2, 2019

Schmidt telescope, two astronomers at Palomar Observatory spotted a thin streak made by a rapidly moving object.

From Time Magazine Archive

The society will supply the funds; CalTech, which runs Palomar Observatory, will supply the Schmidt telescope to do the mapping.

From Time Magazine Archive