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Would this be far enough out to use the sun's gravitational lensing to image distant planets? It seems like the idea was to send a bunch of instruments way out
by bsdetector 1y ago
Would this be far enough out to use the sun's gravitational lensing to image distant planets?
It seems like the idea was to send a bunch of instruments way out and then take pictures in the brief time they were at a useful distance, but if there's a planet out there we can orbit and so stop the instruments at that distance it seems like we could make a permanent super telescope.
- fallingknife 1y agoProbably easier to just put it in solar orbit at that distance. Orbital velocity is only about 1km/s at 700 AU.
- codesnik 1y agoorbiting a planet in that case is no different than orbiting a sun on the same orbit as planet. Probably even more cumbersome, all that jiggling around. Or are you talking about making a gravity assist to turn the orbit of the probe into less eccentric?