Feasibility Study and Opto-Mechanical Design for the Extremely Wide Field of View MezzoCielo Telescope

Recent discoveries in the astronomical and astrophysical fields have highlighted the need for next generation telescopes, increasingly high-performance in terms of angular resolution and Field of View and, hence, more and more extended in size. New optical systems, both space- and ground-based, are currently (or expected to) providing scientists the instruments they need to carry out their research activities: the James Webb, the Extremely Large Telescope, the Vera Rubin Observatory, the Argus project are only few examples. Moreover, alongside the scientific aspects, when discussing of astronomical observations, nowadays it’s also mandatory to deal with the problem of the pollution of the Low Earth Orbits with man-made objects, the so-called space debris, a threat for human activities in the space surrounding our planet: their extremely high kinetic energy makes the debris hazardous even for the International Space Station in case of random collision. Several programs and projects have nowadays been established in order to mitigate the collision probability. One of the proposed solutions is the reduction of the number of debris in orbit, a remedy which can be applied only with prior knowledge of the trajectories actually followed by these human-made artifacts: essentially, a mapping of the space debris population is required. And, once again, large telescopes with wide Field of View are of great value in performing such operation. MezzoCielo telescope is a novel concept of refractive monocentric optical system which aims to fulfill the demanding requests of both science and environmental sustainability. Indeed, the combination of a relatively large aperture (1-m class) and an extremely wide Field of View (estimated to be around 10^4 square degrees) makes the telescope a versatile instrument: capable of observing the entire sky simultaneously (there is no need for pointing), once operational, it could be particularly powerful in generating a map of the debris population and patrolling the outer space searching for transient phenomena. MezzoCielo is the first optical system of its kind: this means that the initial step to be undertaken is a feasibility study, in both optical and mechanical terms. In this work, the feasibility study of MezzoCielo is presented, and the opto-mechanical sizing of the instrument as well.