No this is completly diffent the link you sent explains that they use a laser to create an artificial dot in the sky and then they measure the distortion in the atmosphere and use a flexible mirror to compensate for this distorion, with the compensation the stars apper more clearly. What I saw was completely different, they basically used a giant green colored laser to burn a hole in the atmosphere, then for a very shor amount of time they were able to take pictures through that hole with no distortion. These are two different thngs. Scott Raun wrote: > On Thu, Aug 09, 2001 at 02:45:01PM +0100, Andrew Nemchenko wrote: > > > I've seen scientists use a high powered laser to burn a hole in the > > atmosphere and then look through the microscope throught that > > hole. Since there is no atmosphere there is not light refraction, > > therefore they were able to see stars and planets very clearly with > > out any twinkle to them. > > That's not what they're doing - see > http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap010425.html (the NASA Astronomy > Picture of the day for 25 April 2001) for a neat related picture. > Basically, they know what the laser should look like in the > atmosphere, and they can use adaptive optics to make the laser look > "right", thereby eliminating (or at least reducing) the atmospheric > blurring. > > -- > Scott Raun > sraun at fireopal.org > _______________________________________________ > tclug-list mailing list > tclug-list at mn-linux.org > https://mailman.mn-linux.org/mailman/listinfo/tclug-list ------ http://USFamily.Net/info - Unlimited Internet - From $8.99/mo! ------ -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: drew.vcf Type: text/x-vcard Size: 265 bytes Desc: Card for Andrew Nemchenko Url : http://shadowknight.real-time.com/pipermail/tclug-list/attachments/20010809/6fbf6657/drew.vcf