Astronomy:Couder telescope

Schematic representation of the beam path of a "Couder" or "Schwarzschild telescope"

The Couder telescope is a reflecting telescope developed by André Couder in 1926 and named after him. The design of this telescope is similar to the Schwarzschild telescope.

The telescope consists of two aspherical concave mirrors and is free from the aberrations of coma, astigmatism and spherical aberration. It therefore has a large field of view, which, however, is curved like a Schmidt camera. The focus is also inside the telescope, so it is only suitable for photographic purposes. The large distance required between the mirrors is a disadvantage. Compared to the Schwarzschild telescope, the Couder telescope has a larger field of view due to the elimination of astigmatism, but is less compact.

Couder made a pair of mirrors for a telescope with 0.8 m aperture, which was not implemented.

Weblinks

• R. V. Willstrop: The modified Couder telescope, Bibcode: 1984MNRAS.209..587W

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