Asteroid hunters want to launch private telescope

Asteroids are leftovers from the formation of the solar system some 4.5 billion years ago. Most reside in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter now some get nudged into Earth's neighborhood.

The group has received seed money — several hundreds of thousands of dollars — from venture capitalists and Silicon Valley outfits to create a team of experts. Lu, the foundation chair, said he was confident donors will step up and noted that some of the world's most powerful telescopes including the Lick and Palomar observatories in California were built with private money.