Schott has received its biggest order to date from the People's Republic of China for the supply of "Zerodur©"-mirror blanks.
The first part-shipment for the main mirror consisting of 40 segments and two further test mirrors will be made in 2002.
The Large Sky Area Multi-Object Fiber Spectroscopic Telescope - or LAMOST for short - is a special telescope in the form of a reflecting "Schmidt" system and it can observe a wide area of sky. In fact, its field of view is five degrees and it will be able to take in the spectra of up to 4,000 objects at once. By comparison an 8 m telescope can only observe an area of 2-5 minutes. The telescope comprises a flat direction-changing mirror and a spherical 6.3 m diameter main mirror made up of forty 1 m hexagonal "Zerodur©" mirror carriers. Schott received the order for the main mirror in June 2001.