Boffins unveil sharpest ever stellar snaps

[Rick]

Astronomers working at the Palomar observatory have taken some of the clearest ever pictures of space. A US and UK team of stargazers have taken advantage of new adaptive optics technology to out-do even the Hubble Space Telescope for sharpness.

The problem with taking pictures of stars from the ground is that the atmosphere gets in the way. One way round this is to put your camera in space. But the Cambridge Institute of Astronomy scientists have developed a technique that takes advantage of fluctuations in atmospheric haze to snap the sharpest possible image of the heavens.

More: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/09/04/sharp_snaps/

[mickw]

Cambridge University seem to have discovered a "new" imaging technique involving stacking images - Sound familiar ?
http://news.yahoo.com/s/space/20070905/sc_space/luckycamerarivalshubblesclarity
http://www.ast.cam.ac.uk/~optics/Lucky_Web_Site/index.htm
The thing that's not being mentioned right off the bat is the new CCD imagers being developed - which will probably cost the earth.
http://www.e2v.com/products/advanced-imaging-and-semiconductors/imaging-l3vision.cfm.

Sorry Rick, perhaps I should read all posts before submitting   
Still, got some extra links,
Mick

[Rick]

That's Ok. I'll merge the threads.

And thanks for adding the info.