Eliminating the Coriols Effect in Liquid Mirrors
arXiv:astro-ph/0108306 · doi:10.1086/324416
Abstract
If uncorrected, the Coriolis force due to the rotation of the Earth causes significant aberration of images produced by large liquid-mirror telescopes. We show that this problem can be eliminated by a fixed compensating tilt of the liquid-mirror rotation axis. The required tilt angle, which is a function of latitude and mirror rotation rate, is of order 10 arcsec for current telescopes. This result removes the last fundamental obstacle to achieving diffraction-limited performance with large liquid mirrors.
8 pages 1 figure, submitted to PASP