paraOptics maker Cranfield University's precision engineering department has been riding along the waves of a resurgence in UK's big science programs. It can be remembered that Cranfield made grinding machines for the mirrors for the Keck telescope, the measuring machines for the Chandra X-ray space telescope and also worked on the diamond turning machines for the Atomic Weapons Establishment at Aldermaston. Recently, Cranfield commenced operation of the Hexagon Loxham Laboratory in Bedfordshire, which is a facility for machining and measuring the micro mirror arrays that Cranfeild manufactures for the James Webb space telescope. Today, Cranfield boasts of the largest, most accurate coordinating measuring machine in any UK university./para
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