Transit Telescope

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The Transit Telescope was a 218ft parabolic reflecting aerial built at Jodrell Bank Observatory in 1947. At the time, it was the largest radio telescope in the world. It consisted of a wire mesh suspended from a ring of scaffold poles, which focussed radio signals to a focal point 150ft above the ground. By moving the focal point, the telescope could be pointed at different parts of the sky.

The telescope discovered radio noise from the Great Nebula in Andromeda - the first definite detection of a extragalactic radio source - and the remains of Tycho's supernova in the radio frequency; no obvious optical remnant remains.

[edit] References

• The Early History. Jodrell Bank Observatory. Retrieved on 2006-11-22.