Telescope Resolving Power (Dawes/Rayleigh)

Inspectable records

Ledger state

The current ledger marks this instrument verified clean within the source-bound verification corpus.

Area

Earth & Space (astronomy, orbital mechanics, meteorology, geology, geodesy, oceanography)

Tranche

tranche-4

Evidence ID

t4-005

Ledger rows

1

No ledger note is attached.

Review findings

The existing honest label appropriately warns that this is an idealized diffraction limit and that real seeing often dominates. The Rayleigh implementation must explicitly convert radians to arcseconds, and the UI should distinguish the empirical Dawes double-star criterion from the physical Rayleigh diffraction criterion.

Formula and scope findings

• The Rayleigh formula θ=1.22λ/D returns angular resolution in radians when λ and D use the same length unit; it does not directly return arcseconds as claimed. The output must multiply by 206264.806 (approximately 206265) to convert radians to arcseconds.
• The Dawes formula θ=116/D(mm) is an empirical double-star criterion in arcseconds, not a universal diffraction limit; the instrument should label it specifically as the Dawes criterion.

Unit assumptions

• For Dawes, aperture D must be in millimeters and the result is in arcseconds.
• For Rayleigh, wavelength and aperture must use identical length units before division; the result is radians unless multiplied by 206264.806 arcseconds per radian.
• The aperture must be a positive physical diameter, not radius or area.
• Wavelength should be specified as a vacuum or air wavelength consistently; this distinction is usually negligible for the displayed precision.

Boundary hardening

BREAK_CLAIMED · SELF_FLAGGED

Zero aperture produces undefined division in both formulas, and the specification does not define automatic selection between Dawes and Rayleigh or make aperture and wavelength units explicit.

Errata and corrections

No applied erratum is attached to this unique-name record.

Inspectable example

4 review vectors are recorded. One source-bound sample is shown below.

{
  "inputs": {
    "aperture_mm": 50,
    "wavelength_nm": 500
  },
  "expected_outputs": {
    "dawes_arcsec": 2.32,
    "rayleigh_arcsec": 2.516433
  },
  "working": "Dawes: 116 / 50 mm = 2.32 arcsec. Rayleigh: 500 nm = 5.00×10^-7 m; 50 mm = 0.050 m; θ = 1.22 × (5.00×10^-7 / 0.050) = 1.22×10^-5 rad; θ = 1.22×10^-5 × 206265 = 2.516433 arcsec."
}

Related workflows

Sources and evidence

These pointers bind the page to evidence. They do not grant authority or collapse verification into deployment.

• VERIFIED_LEDGER.json · VERIFIED_CLEAN
• evidence-tranche4/tranche4-results.json
• BOUNDARY_HAZARD_CATALOG.json