Refractor Telescope

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What is a Refractor telescope?

A refracting telescope is a type of optical telescope, that magnifies objects from far away. It does this by refracting the light rays it collects to create an image that is inverted and thus magnified.

There are many different types of telescopes but most have the same parts to them. Refracting telescopes have two convex lenses:
The Objective lense - this lense has a greater diameter than the second lense as the greater the aperture, the more light it can collect and bring into focus at the focal point.
The Eye Lens - this is where the viewer can view the final image.

How does the telescope work?
Telescopes work by manipulating light waves and using properties of lenses …show more content…

The Eyepiece doesn't need a large aperture as it is not collecting any light. The larger diameter of the objective lense also means its focal length will be much longer than the smaller eye lense.

Behavior of light passing through different media

A medium is any region that allows waves to travel through them. The ease that the waves can travel through depends of the medium’s Index of refraction (Optical Density.)

A refractive index is a measure of the velocity light rays can travel in that medium, compared to a vacuum.

When light rays change mediums refraction occurs.This when light rays change speed as it is travelling from one medium to another that has a different refractive index to each other. Uninterrupted, light rays will travel in millions of straight lines, however if light travels through a medium that has a higher index of refraction, that lightwave will slow down and bend towards the normal. This will make the object look as if it were bent.However if the light wave travels through a medium that is less dense, it will speed up and bend away from the normal as it can now travel faster than

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