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To me, the coolest thing about this story is the telescope that was used to find this galaxy. It's literally a bunch of off-the-shelf Canon telephoto lenses st

To me, the coolest thing about this story is the telescope that was used to find this galaxy. It's literally a bunch of off-the-shelf Canon telephoto lenses stuck together on a metal frame, each with a camera sensor, with coordinated aim and focus. Apparently, some of the newer Canon lenses have a newfangled anti-reflective coating with unprecedented performance. So some enterprising Canucks said, "you know, maybe we can buy a bunch of those and tape them together and make a world-class scientific instrument, eh?" And then they fucking did it. That there is the DIY hacker spirit in broad daylight. It's so awesome I can barely stand it. You can read about it here, which found via Phil Plait's excellent blog: http://www.dunlap.utoronto.ca/instrumentation/dragonfly/ http://www.dunlap.utoronto.ca/instrumentation/dragonfly/

oh_sigh 9y ago
I think your link is actually the more relevant one for this story on hn.
fsloth 9y ago
"To me, the coolest thing about this story is the telescope that was used to find this galaxy." Uh, we just found out a new principle on the large scale organization of matter in the known universe. The method is surely inspirational, but I really have to question your statement that the method of discovery credits more merit than the discovery itself.
- nate_meurer 9y ago
  Relax. It's just, like, my opinion man.
  - fsloth 9y ago
    Sure, sorry, you did state "to me". English is not my native language and nuances sometimes escape me. The jury rigged ground based telescope is cool.
    - nate_meurer 9y ago
      No worries. Just so you know, I'll take any opportunity to deliver a Big Lebowski reference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QsogswrH6ck https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QsogswrH6ck Consider yourself warned.
- asmithmd1 9y ago
  That is an engineering mindset. I was confused when I first read a review of the "Apollo 13" movie that said engineers think the real heroes of the crises were the engineers on the ground - who else would someone think was a hero? Oh yeah, the astronauts who were risking their lives.
- bringtheaction 9y ago
  I didn’t even know that dark matter was anything more than theoretical.
  - philipov 9y ago
    That depends on how ready you are to dismiss the existing observational evidence for it. While it's by no means proven to exist, it's not something predicted by theory, so it's unfair to call it that. Supersymmetry, for example, is purely theoretical; whereas dark matter is a response to observations that contradict theory.
- koheripbal 9y ago
  > we just found out a new principle on the large scale organization of matter in the known universe. Not really, because we've already knew that and observed it before in the bullet galaxy. This is just a 2nd observation (although it is interesting in the ways it's different).
kartan 9y ago
> a bunch of off-the-shelf Canon telephoto lenses stuck together on a metal frame That's an interesting remark. It's hard to beat mass production. As number produced skyrocket to the millions, it's difficult that a custom device has the resources that a mass marketed device has. That's why millionaires have the same phone that you, the military use Xbox 360 controllers in their submarine's periscopes and COTS supercomputers are common. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beowulf_cluster https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beowulf_cluster https://www.quora.com/What-smartphone-do-tech-billionaires-use https://www.quora.com/What-smartphone-do-tech-billionaires-u... "US Navy submarines are getting Xbox 360 controllers to control their periscopes" https://www.theverge.com/2017/9/19/16333376/us-navy-military-xbox-360-controller https://www.theverge.com/2017/9/19/16333376/us-navy-military...
- ktpsns 9y ago
  In fact, a whole generation of HPC students and scientists write codes for consumer graphics cards (GPGPU). All of this only because they are so cheap.
  - sgt101 9y ago
    I think that the most powerful thing is that they offer a low point of entry. You can start for pretty near free, but for less than £100k you can build a differentiating capability and start contributing to knowledge... vs traditional instruments where the onramp starts at £millions and goes from there.
- lou1306 9y ago
  Thank you! Never heard of the term "Beowulf cluster". Sad to see the Wikipedia page never mention good old Linda, which was developed precisely to allow collaboration in heterogeneous systems. https://www.nytimes.com/1992/01/19/business/david-gelernter-s-romance-with-linda.html https://www.nytimes.com/1992/01/19/business/david-gelernter-...
  - toopok4k3 9y ago
    It's really hard for me to figure out if you were sarcastic or not with your "never heard of the term"? You must be either young or never visited slashdot for it not to be sarcasm. It was a running joke in slashdot on every comment section to have a Beowulf cluster of whatever was mentioned in the article.
Polyisoprene 9y ago
Improves the bokeh as well ;)
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
neuralzen 9y ago
That's very cool! Although wouldn't the UV filter coating on commercial lenses be counter productive? Assuming they are capturing this stuff full (IR to UV) spectrum...
- Obi_Juan_Kenobi 9y ago
  UV filters are generally not incorporated into lenses. Typically you have to use a screw-on filter for this, and this is only needed for film photography. On digital sensors, the sensor contains the filter, usually some sort of Bayer filter that also blocks UV. The fluorite lens elements that Canon uses are desirable not just for their low refractive index, but also precisely because they are highly transparent in the IR and UV range. The 400mm used in this particular array uses two fluorite elements, and is one the main reasons it's suitable for this application.

oh_sigh 9y ago

I think your link is actually the more relevant one for this story on hn.

fsloth 9y ago

"To me, the coolest thing about this story is the telescope that was used to find this galaxy." Uh, we just found out a new principle on the large scale organization of matter in the known universe. The method is surely inspirational, but I really have to question your statement that the method of discovery credits more merit than the discovery itself.

nate_meurer 9y ago
Relax. It's just, like, my opinion man.
- fsloth 9y ago
  Sure, sorry, you did state "to me". English is not my native language and nuances sometimes escape me. The jury rigged ground based telescope is cool.
  - nate_meurer 9y ago
    No worries. Just so you know, I'll take any opportunity to deliver a Big Lebowski reference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QsogswrH6ck https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QsogswrH6ck Consider yourself warned.
asmithmd1 9y ago
That is an engineering mindset. I was confused when I first read a review of the "Apollo 13" movie that said engineers think the real heroes of the crises were the engineers on the ground - who else would someone think was a hero? Oh yeah, the astronauts who were risking their lives.
bringtheaction 9y ago
I didn’t even know that dark matter was anything more than theoretical.
- philipov 9y ago
  That depends on how ready you are to dismiss the existing observational evidence for it. While it's by no means proven to exist, it's not something predicted by theory, so it's unfair to call it that. Supersymmetry, for example, is purely theoretical; whereas dark matter is a response to observations that contradict theory.
koheripbal 9y ago
> we just found out a new principle on the large scale organization of matter in the known universe. Not really, because we've already knew that and observed it before in the bullet galaxy. This is just a 2nd observation (although it is interesting in the ways it's different).

kartan 9y ago

> a bunch of off-the-shelf Canon telephoto lenses stuck together on a metal frame That's an interesting remark. It's hard to beat mass production. As number produced skyrocket to the millions, it's difficult that a custom device has the resources that a mass marketed device has. That's why millionaires have the same phone that you, the military use Xbox 360 controllers in their submarine's periscopes and COTS supercomputers are common. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beowulf_cluster https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beowulf_cluster https://www.quora.com/What-smartphone-do-tech-billionaires-use https://www.quora.com/What-smartphone-do-tech-billionaires-u... "US Navy submarines are getting Xbox 360 controllers to control their periscopes" https://www.theverge.com/2017/9/19/16333376/us-navy-military-xbox-360-controller https://www.theverge.com/2017/9/19/16333376/us-navy-military...

ktpsns 9y ago
In fact, a whole generation of HPC students and scientists write codes for consumer graphics cards (GPGPU). All of this only because they are so cheap.
- sgt101 9y ago
  I think that the most powerful thing is that they offer a low point of entry. You can start for pretty near free, but for less than £100k you can build a differentiating capability and start contributing to knowledge... vs traditional instruments where the onramp starts at £millions and goes from there.
lou1306 9y ago
Thank you! Never heard of the term "Beowulf cluster". Sad to see the Wikipedia page never mention good old Linda, which was developed precisely to allow collaboration in heterogeneous systems. https://www.nytimes.com/1992/01/19/business/david-gelernter-s-romance-with-linda.html https://www.nytimes.com/1992/01/19/business/david-gelernter-...
- toopok4k3 9y ago
  It's really hard for me to figure out if you were sarcastic or not with your "never heard of the term"? You must be either young or never visited slashdot for it not to be sarcasm. It was a running joke in slashdot on every comment section to have a Beowulf cluster of whatever was mentioned in the article.

Polyisoprene 9y ago

Improves the bokeh as well ;)

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

neuralzen 9y ago

That's very cool! Although wouldn't the UV filter coating on commercial lenses be counter productive? Assuming they are capturing this stuff full (IR to UV) spectrum...

Obi_Juan_Kenobi 9y ago
UV filters are generally not incorporated into lenses. Typically you have to use a screw-on filter for this, and this is only needed for film photography. On digital sensors, the sensor contains the filter, usually some sort of Bayer filter that also blocks UV. The fluorite lens elements that Canon uses are desirable not just for their low refractive index, but also precisely because they are highly transparent in the IR and UV range. The 400mm used in this particular array uses two fluorite elements, and is one the main reasons it's suitable for this application.