How does the Lovell Telescope work?
Posted 25 Apr, 2025
The Lovell Telescope collects radio waves – a kind of light which is invisible to us.
There are other types of invisible light you may have heard of, such as ultraviolet or infrared. All these waves travel through space at the speed of light (approximately 300,000 km/s).
Because it’s not collecting visible light, you can’t “look through” the Lovell Telescope, as you might imagine!
Instead, the radio waves (sometimes called ‘signals’) are collected by the telescope (the ‘dish’) and converted into electronic data. This data is stored in supercomputers and analysed by scientists…
Radio waves are emitted by all sorts of objects in space, including stars and galaxies. They also have a much longer wavelength than visible light, which is why radio telescopes must be so much larger than optical telescopes – hence the big dish!
But what about the weather? Since radio telescopes don’t collect visible light, they’re unaffected by the bright daytime sky, allowing them to observe space both day and night.
Additionally, radio waves can pass through Earth’s atmosphere and clouds, meaning radio astronomy is possible even on overcast days!
You can learn more about our telescopes here.
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