Re: ATM Re: Faster Mirror Cooling - thermo electric "Peltier Devices"

[Juan Herrero <jherrero@videotron.ca>]

Hi
The beauty of peltiers is that they transfer heat from one side of the
junction to the other (they actually create some extra heat in the process)
and the direction of this transfer is reversed when you reverse the DC
current. So they can be used for both heating or cooling a given surface.
But they are small and expensive And you would need many of them to cool the
mirror evenly. making for a very expensive and complex mirror cell.
Professional observatories tend to use the technique of channeling differing
amounts of temperature regulated air to different parts of the mirror to
attain thermal stability through the entire glass..

Thanks
Juan