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First Telescope Created
Hans Lippershey is credited with the first refracting telescope patent. -
Galileo Upgrades the Telescope
Galileo Galilee combined different lenses to increase the distance you're able to see with it. He discovered some of the moons orbiting Jupiter. He also discovered that Venus orbits the Sun, and so do all the other planets. The Earth isn't the center of the universe. -
Isaac Newton's Telescope
Isaac Newton discovers that light comes to a much finer point using a mirror instead of lenses. He makes the first reflecting mirror. It's small. -
William Hershel Goes Bigger
William Hershel creates larger curved mirrors using specula. They are able to collect more light and he sees farther. He discovers the planet Uranus and doubles the size of the solar system. -
George Ellery Hale Mt. Wilson Observatory
George Ellery Hale built the Mount Wilson Observatory and constructed the 60-inch Hale reflecting telescope and the 100-inch Hooker reflecting telescope which advanced many discoveries. -
Edwin Hubble
Edwin Hubble worked at the Mt. Wilson observatory and discovered many things including red-shift of galaxies and the fact that these "nebulae" we saw were actually distant galaxies like the Andromeda galaxy. He also discovered the farther away something is the faster it travels (Hubble's Law). -
Penzias and Wilson
Penzias and Wilson accidentally discovered the radiation said to be leftover from the Big Bang. It was named Cosmic Background Radiation. They used the Holdem Horn Antenna. -
The Hubble Space Telescope
The Hubble Space Telescope was launched April 24th, 1990. It's designed to pick up on ultraviolet, visible, and infrared light. It's had 4 service missions since launch, the last in 2009. Being out of Earth's atmosphere allows it to take the most detailed photos possible. It's mde enormous contributions to space exploration. -
WMAP
The Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe operated from 2001-2010. It measured differences across the sky in the temperature of the cosmic microwave background. It established the Lambda-CDM model, the standard model of the Big Bang Cosmology. It accounts for many properties of the cosmos. -
Kepler Telescope
The Kepler Telescope, named after Renaissance astronomer Johannes Kepler, was launched to discover Earth-like exoplanets. It's orbital height is 92 million miles. It has discovered hundreds of exoplanets out there, a few being Earth-like.
