Conceptual Design of the Chinese-Russian On-Orbit-Assembling Space Telescope (OAST)

Astronomical space telescopes with large apertures of various spectral ranges have become one of the main tools of exploring the Universe. Conventional technologies do not allow increasing the space telescope aperture above several meters. This article describes the conceptual design of an UV and IR On-orbit Assembling Space Telescope (OAST) with an aperture of 10 m. Unlike conventional space telescopes, the OAST will be modularly designed, manufactured, and then assembled and alignment in space.