The NASA-LMT was a 3 m (9.8 ft)
apertureliquid-mirror telescope located in NODO's main dome. It consisted of a 3 m diameter
parabolic dish that held 4 U.S. gallons (15 L) of a highly reflective
liquid metal,
mercury, spinning at a rate of 10 rpm, with sensors mounted above on a fixed structure. Due to the
primary mirror's material, the NASA-LMT was configured as a
zenith telescope. Using 20 narrowband filters, it cataloged
space debris in Earth's orbit.[2] The telescope was initially completed in 1994 at NASA's
Johnson Space Center, and moved to Cloudcroft the following year, where it operated routinely until June 2002.[3] The LMT was also used for the UBC-NASA Multi-Narrowband survey, which examined galaxies at moderate
redshifts.[4] When it was retired, some of the components were used in the 6 m (20 ft)
Large Zenith Telescope in
British Columbia.
^Cabanac, Remi A.; Borra, Ermanno F.; Beauchemin, Mario (10 December 1998). "A Search for Peculiar Objects with the NASA Orbital Debris Observatory 3 Meter Liquid Mirror Telescope". The Astrophysical Journal. 509 (1): 309–323.
arXiv:astro-ph/9804267.
Bibcode:
1998ApJ...509..309C.
doi:
10.1086/306488.
S2CID119434586.
^MULROONEY, M. (May 2007).
"The NASA Liquid Mirror Telescope"(PDF). Orbital Debris Quarterly News. NASA Orbital Debris Program Office. Archived from
the original(PDF) on 2012-02-15. Retrieved 2012-01-22.
^Hickson, Paul; Mulrooney, Mark K. (1 March 1998). "University of British Columbia–NASA Multi‐Narrowband Survey. I. Description and Photometric Properties of the Survey". The Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series. 115 (1): 35–42.
Bibcode:
1998ApJS..115...35H.
doi:
10.1086/313080.
^Jarvis, K. S.; Africano, J. L.; Sydney, P. F.; Stansbery, E. G.; Thumm, T. L.; Jorgensen, K.; Mulrooney, M. (2001). "Observations of the geosynchronous Earth orbital debris environment using NASA's CCD Debris Telescope". In: Proceedings of the Third European Conference on Space Debris. 473: 95.
Bibcode:
2001ESASP.473...95J.