Vera C. Rubin Observatory Unveils First Images from World’s Largest Digital Camera
Vera C. Rubin Observatory Unveils First Images from World’s Largest Digital Camera
On June 23, the Vera C. Rubin Observatory, located atop Cerro Pachón in northern Chile, released its first images to the public. The observatory, a joint project of the National Science Foundation and the U.S. Department of Energy, features an 8.4-meter Simonyi Survey Telescope equipped with a 3,200-megapixel digital camera—the largest ever built, weighing approximately 3,000 kg.
The camera, assembled at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, was installed on the telescope in early 2025. Its primary function is to support the Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST), a decade-long project to map and catalog billions of galaxies across the southern sky. The LSST will involve repeatedly scanning the southern sky every three nights, utilizing six different colored filters to capture images across various light spectra. The observatory will capture an area the size of 40 full moons with each 30-second exposure, and over 10 years of operations, around 800 deep exposures will be acquired for every part of the accessible sky.
The Rubin Observatory’s initial image release coincided with a global celebration, including a main event in Washington, D.C., and numerous watch parties worldwide. Researchers from UC Santa Cruz played a significant role in the observatory’s development, contributing to various aspects, from early camera system development to ongoing dark energy and dark matter research within the LSST Dark Energy Science Collaboration (DESC), which currently includes over 1,300 scientists from more than 20 countries. The UC Santa Cruz involvement spans scientific collaborations and technical development, including contributions from students and alumni.
The observatory’s construction cost approximately $810 million and involved hundreds of scientists, engineers, and support staff. The project aims to advance science in four key areas: understanding dark matter and dark energy; cataloging the solar system; exploring the changing sky; and studying the Milky Way’s structure and formation. The observatory’s automated system will compare new images to previous ones, issuing alerts within minutes of detecting any changes. This will allow for rapid observation of transient events such as supernovae and the identification of asteroids and comets.
The observatory is named after Vera C. Rubin, a pioneering American astronomer whose work provided crucial evidence for the existence of dark matter. Her collaboration with Sandra Faber, a renowned UC Santa Cruz astrophysicist, significantly impacted the field of astronomy. The Rubin Observatory is the first national observatory named after a woman.
The released images represent the first data from the Rubin Observatory’s operational phase. The full LSST survey is expected to begin in late 2025, promising an unprecedented dataset for astronomical research and public engagement. The observatory’s unique capabilities combine real-time sky monitoring with the detection of faint and distant objects on an unprecedented scale.
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