All the Telescopes of the World – History of Space Research. Polish Contribution to the Exploration and Conquest of Space

The exhibition presents the history of astronomical research and a broad range of topics related to astronomical instruments. The exhibition will not lack stories about Galileo, Mikołaj Kopernik and Jan Heweliusz, precursors of space research. The exhibition aims to encourage visitors to deepen their knowledge of astronomy and the exploration of outer space.

The new permanent exhibition All the Telescopes of the World – History of Space Research. Polish Contribution to the Exploration and Conquest of Space will be available at the National Museum of Technology in Warsaw from 20 February 2024. The exhibition presents the history of astronomical research and a broad range of topics related to astronomical instruments. The exhibition will not lack stories about Galileo, Mikołaj Kopernik and Jan Heweliusz, precursors of space research. The exhibition aims to encourage visitors to deepen their knowledge of astronomy and the exploration of outer space.

The exhibition narrative begins with the presentation of Galileo's telescope, which was the first optical instrument used in astronomical research, and ends with contemporary stationary installations with giant optics and telescopic devices currently placed in outer space. It is impossible to present the history of telescopes without the story of the most perfect observing instrument, the human eye, and without introducing geometry and optics, without which the exploration of the cosmos would not be possible.

Space research is a very complex issue, related not only to telescopes but above all to human expeditions equipped with measuring instruments and detectors. This also includes sending robots to penetrate space and time. An important theme of the exhibition is the question of scale. This concerns micro and macro dimensions, speed, time, temperature, pressure, density, and large and small numbers. This issue is presented using models, mock-ups, descriptions and audiovisual presentations.

Great emphasis has been placed on the contribution of Poles to the history of space research. Among the topics presented in the exhibition, the story of our great astronomer Mikołaj Kopernik cannot be missing. This part of the exhibition focuses primarily on his great intellectual and experimental work concerning the heliocentric system. We explain how knowledge of mathematics, geometry and fairly simple measuring instruments led to this epoch-making discovery. Undoubtedly, Mikołaj Kopernik is one of the most important figures in world science, and his work De revolutionibus orbium coelestium (On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres) is one of the most important scientific works in human history. When we speak of the Polish contribution to research and the conquest of space, the name Jan Heweliusz cannot be omitted – creator of the first maps of the Moon, designer of the famous tubeless telescope, designer of the polemoscope and many important astronomical instruments. For his achievements in astronomical research he was elected the first foreign member in the history of the London The Royal Society.

Contemporary scientists cannot be missing from the exhibition, such as Mirosław Hermaszewski – the first Polish cosmonaut, Kazimierz Kordylewski – discoverer of dust moons of the Earth at the Lagrange points, awarded the NASA Bronze Medal for contributions to astronomical research, Bohdan Paczyński– who, in the search for planets or other objects distant from the Earth beyond the Solar System, used the method of gravitational microlensing, and was awarded the im. Hanry N. Russell prize by the American Astronomical Society. But also currently active and developing researchers and scientists such as Aleksander Wolszczan – discoverer of the first planets outside the Solar System, and Sławosz Uznański – engineer and project astronaut, who will soon set off, in full view of the whole world, on his conquest…