Author: Houren Pan

The National Space Science Center of the Chinese Academy of Sciences

An Ingenious Dual"Co-"Approach: A New Highlight for the Tiangong Space Station

The initial proposal toequip China's Tiangong Space Station with another large-aperture astronomical telescope payload was an exceptional concept, significantly enhancing the space station's utilization efficiency. Chinese scientists pioneered the unprecedented concept of a co-orbiting space telescope with the space station. This design optimally mitigates disturbances from various spacecraft mechanical operations and astronaut intravehicular activities on the telescope's observations. Meanwhile, it still facilitates the long-term operation, maintenance, upgrades, and performance enhancements of astronomical telescopes in space. The coaxial optical system offers distinct advantages over off-axis systems in terms of investment, development cycle, manufacturing complexity, and testing difficulty. Such designs have been widely adopted, with their merits iteratively validated in practical applications. The evolution of China's space program—from the “Dongfanghong-1 satellite” to crewed spaceflight, and from the “BeiDou”, “Chang'e”, to “Tianwen” missions—has consistently pursued maximizing utility with economical investment and concise approaches. The adoption of a coaxial architecture for the space telescope aligns precisely with this established engineering philosophy. Integrating this space telescope with China's advanced information transmission technologies and incorporating enhanced AI technologies will undoubtedly be a considerable advancement to our nation's discovery of the cosmos and aerospace aspirations.