The diameters of Alpha Centauri A and B - A comparison of the asteroseismic and VINCI/VLTI views — mentioned by joshvm

Sat, 28 Jun 2025 03:57:58 GMT

It's a lot easier to reason about this using angular resolution, because that's normally what the diffraction limit formula is in reference to. If you know the angular diameter of the system (α) and the wavelength (say λ=500 nm for visible), you can use α ≈ λ/d and solve for the aperture of the telescope (d). That puts a basic limit on the smallest thing you can resolve with a given aperture. You can use the angular diameter of the planet and the resolution you're after. For Alpha Centauri A it's 8.5 milli arc-second, so O(1 μas) for a 100px image? That's just for the star! The Event Horizon…

Paper and discussion history. A mention is not an endorsement.

The diameters of Alpha Centauri A and B - A comparison of the asteroseismic and VINCI/VLTI views · HackerPapers discussions

The diameters of Alpha Centauri A and B - A comparison of the asteroseismic and VINCI/VLTI views — mentioned by joshvm