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A parabolic (or paraboloid or paraboloidal) reflector (or dish or mirror) is a reflective surface used to collect or project energy such as light, sound, or radio waves. Its shape is part of a circular paraboloid , that is, the surface generated by a parabola revolving around its axis.
A parabolic trough collector (PTC) is a type of solar thermal collector that is straight in one dimension and curved as a parabola in the other two, lined with a polished metal mirror. The sunlight which enters the mirror parallel to its plane of symmetry is focused along the focal line , where objects are positioned that are intended to be heated.
Solar parabolic dish. With a parabolic dish collector, one or more parabolic dishes concentrate solar energy at a single focal point, similar to the way a reflecting telescope focuses starlight, or a dish antenna focuses radio waves. This geometry may be used in solar furnaces and solar power plants.
A parabolic solar dish concentrating the sun's rays on the heating element of a Stirling engine. The entire unit acts as a solar tracker. A dish Stirling system uses a large, reflective, parabolic dish (similar in shape to a satellite television dish). It focuses all the sunlight that strikes the dish up onto a single point above the dish ...
A parabolic antenna is an antenna that uses a parabolic reflector, a curved surface with the cross-sectional shape of a parabola, to direct the radio waves. The most common form is shaped like a dish and is popularly called a dish antenna or parabolic dish. The main advantage of a parabolic antenna is that it has high directivity.
Parabolic trough and concentrating linear Fresnel reflectors are classified as linear focus collector types, while dish and solar tower are point focus types. Linear focus collectors achieve medium concentration factors (50 suns and over), and point focus collectors achieve high concentration factors (over 500 suns).
This design is an alternative to the most common parabolic antenna design, called "front feed" or "prime focus", in which the feed antenna itself is mounted suspended in front of the dish at the focus, pointed back toward the dish. The Cassegrain is a more complex design, but in certain applications it has advantages over front feed that can ...
The Big Dish is a parabolic dish concentrator developed by the Australian National University's Solar Thermal Group. [1] The initial prototype, SG3 [ 2 ] , was constructed on the Canberra campus of the Australian National University in 1994.