("National Reconnaissance Office Deputy Director Air Force Maj. Gen. Ellen Pawlikowski [...] officiated at the unveiling of the Naval Postgraduate School’s latest high-tech research and teaching acquisition, the agency’s Segmented Mirror Space Telescope. The Naval Postgraduate School is the proud new home for the Segmented Mirror Space Telescope (SMT), designed and developed for the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) as a technical demonstrator and experimental testbed for cutting-edge space imaging technologies.")
These instruments are making single-mirror telescopes (like the ones described in TFA) obsolete.
http://www.nps.edu/About/News/NPS-New-Home-for-Giant-Segment...
("National Reconnaissance Office Deputy Director Air Force Maj. Gen. Ellen Pawlikowski [...] officiated at the unveiling of the Naval Postgraduate School’s latest high-tech research and teaching acquisition, the agency’s Segmented Mirror Space Telescope. The Naval Postgraduate School is the proud new home for the Segmented Mirror Space Telescope (SMT), designed and developed for the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) as a technical demonstrator and experimental testbed for cutting-edge space imaging technologies.")
These instruments are making single-mirror telescopes (like the ones described in TFA) obsolete.