An extremely large telescope (ELT) of the European Southern Observatory (ESO), designed to monitor the exoplanets of the earth's group and measure the expansion of the Universe, received a protective shell. The world's largest visible and infrared telescope, being built on Mount Cerro Armazones in Chile's Atacama Desert, now has a frame with a diameter of 93 meters, that is, the size of a football field..

New photos from ESO show that the dome frame is already ready, and the outer shell completely closing the telescope is still being built. It is expected that a powerful telescope will be completely functional until 2028, writes Space. com.

According to the European Observatory, aluminum plates will be added to the outer part of the frame to protect the telescope from the extreme environment of the attack desert.

The construction of a large telescope can be observed on the laboratory page using the installed webcams. Recent images show cranes busy installing the outer aluminum layers, also known as skins.. According to experts, part of the dome will have a large sliding door that will remain closed during the day and open at night, allowing the telescope to view the sky.

The progress was also achieved in the multifaceted structure inside the dome, which will support the main mirror of the telescope (M1), and in the “spider -like” structure at its top, which will hold the secondary mirror (M2) in the telescope, experts are described by specialists.

Interestingly, the central mirror of M1 will be an exceptional 39 meters in diameter, while M2, which will be completed later this year, will have a diameter of 4.25 meters.

The European Southern Observatory also showed the internal frame of the "

According to the designers, the skeleton itself is ready and he is awaiting receipt of all the individual segments, which will include five mirrors.

It is known that M1 alone consists of 798 glass-ceramic hexagonal segments, each of which is about 5 centimeters thick and approximately 1.5 meters in diameter. When fully equipped, M1 will be the largest mirror ever created for an optical telescope, the developers say.

According to the builders, the central tower, metal structure and polygonal base will be placed on the so-called high-rise structure. This metal frame has a height of 50 meters and is designed to accommodate all 5 ELT mirrors and rotation so that the telescope can be directed to different parts of the sky, they say in ESO.