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Gold in telescopes, sounds weird, huh? When it is first heard it, the first thought that comes in my mind is that some kind of jewellery or decor, which contains gold. However, when it is looked at deeply, and researched thoroughly, it comes to surface that telescopes are expensive, and are a symbol of aristocracy and nobility, thus addition of gold to the telescope increases its value. However, there is more to it; it has functional use as well.

What is a telescope and why is it used? It has been derived from a Greek meaning to look far off. Telescope is an optical device to view distant objects; it was made to view heavenly bodies like stars, planets and was used by astronomers.

The famous Greek philosopher, scientist Galileo to observe the planetary motion, formerly used telescope. He was the first one to declare that earth is not really the centre of solar system, instead it is the sun, and he made this discovery using the telescope.

However, there have been records found of telescopes used by Democritus, Pythagoras, Babylonians, and old Chinese as when they recorded their observations in their transcripts.

Telescopes have concave and convex mirrors for the purpose of reflection and refraction. As mirrors are coated with an amalgam to make them reflect and refract, but some of the reflected rays are absorbed by the amalgam of silver and mercury because of the non-inert characteristic of both mercury, and silver. Here gold comes in!

Gold is one of the most inert elements of the earth, as it needs a combination of acids to make it react. It absorbs less, and reflects more, thus if the mirror surfaces are coated with gold, the image captured through telescope has much less chances of being lost, blurred or hazy.

Another reason for the use of gold is that it is very thick and solid, i.e. the atoms are compactly packed, thus the angles, which the gold plated mirrors reflected are very small and easy to view.

Bronze can also be used for the purpose, but bronze erodes fast, becomes dull, and needs regular cleaning as compared to gold. Dismantling a telescope frequently for the sake of cleaning is not really advisable, thus gold is used much more often.

Nowadays telescopes with gold plated mirrors are used worldwide, because of their better performance.

The author has written more about decorative gold mirrors here: decorative gold mirrors