The first telescopes used lenses, known as refracting telescopes. Small instruments – whether for amateur astronomers starting out or people keen to look at distant mountains or spy on their neighbors ...

Though still only in the prototype stage, this flat lens could one day be used on space telescopes, and perhaps even on ...

Well, any of us who has ever looked through a telescope could say the same, for the two principal types in use today were developed by giants: the refractor by Galileo and the reflector by Newton.

However, in most cases, such an advertised magnification is well beyond the practical maximum magnification of the telescope. A 2.4-inch refracting telescope, for example, should never use more ...

The Newtonian reflecting telescope has been in use for centuries since its invention by Isaac Newton in 1668. Unlike refracting telescopes (whose lenses are very expensive), the Newtonian ...

McKim Observatory still houses many of its original instruments, including a 9.53 inch Clark Refractor telescope, a meridian transit telescope, and a gravity driven chronograph. Missing from the early ...

Subsequent observers took the design of glass-lensed, refracting telescopes to great lengths, sometimes literally so. In Danzig, Johannes Hevelius deployed a telescope 150 feet long; hung by ropes ...

The Beaverlab Finder TW2 is not a smart telescope, but its design makes it unique. This 82mm/3.2-inch refractor is one of a kind in that a lightweight plastic camera can be attached to it in place ...

We put Starfield Optics' flagship Géar telescope — the Starfield Géar 115 Triplet APO — to the test. It did not disappoint.

For the first time, a flat telescope lens has been produced that represents colors accurately, offering a way to make less bulky lenses that could be sent into space cheaply. The first telescopes ...