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Scientific American
a day ago
- Science
- Scientific American
World's Biggest Digital Camera Will Release Its First Photos of the Night Sky. How to Watch Live
A brand-new, cutting-edge telescope called the Vera C. Rubin Observatory is about to release its first images to the world, and the public can watch in real time. On June 23 the observatory will unveil a first look at ultrahigh-definition images and videos of the cosmos taken from a mountaintop in Chile. And you can participate by joining a public livestream (in English and Spanish) or one of the in-person watch parties at planetariums, universities and museums around the globe. These watch parties will include a stream of the live unveiling event, as well as three-dimensional virtual tours of the observatory and its surroundings on the peak of Cerro Pachón, a mountain in the Chilean Andes. Space enthusiasts who can get to a watch party at a planetarium will be rewarded with immersive full-dome images of the horizon-to-horizon Southern Hemisphere night sky. U.S. planetariums throwing watch parties include the Adler Planetarium in Chicago, the CCNY Planetarium at the City College of New York, the Fogg Planetarium at the Challenger Learning Center of Tallahassee in Florida, the Eastern Michigan University Planetarium in Ypsilanti, the Fiske Planetarium in Boulder, Colo., and the Ritter Planetarium at the University of Toledo in Ohio, among others. A full list can be found at the Rubin Observatory Watch Party website. On supporting science journalism If you're enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today. The Vera C. Rubin Observatory takes a full image of the southern sky every three nights using the 8.4-meter Simonyi Survey telescope, whose array of mirrors includes the largest convex mirror ever made. The view from the telescope is photographed with the Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST) camera, which is the largest digital camera ever made—about the size of a car. The sky images can be stitched together to show changes in the cosmos, such as the movements of comets through the solar system. During the public events, you'll also get to watch one of the observatory's high-resolution time-lapse 'movies' of the visible sky. It will be sky watching in high definition: the observatory is designed to show very detailed views of the universe in crisp detail over wide areas, so viewers will get a glimpse of distant galaxies, galaxy clusters and stars. One goal is to map the Milky Way and look for streams of stars that are the remnants of galaxies that were torn apart by their neighbors eons ago. These remnants can help scientists understand how the Milky Way formed. Another goal is to catalog the solar system's asteroids and comets, as well as farther-flung transient phenomena such as supernovae. Finally astronomers want to use the Rubin Observatory to understand dark matter, which has mass but doesn't release or reflect light. So while you won't get a glimpse of this pervasive matter, astronomers can study it through its gravitational effects on visible matter, such as the galaxies and galaxy clusters that the LSST camera will photograph night after night. Anyone can sign up to host a watch party at the Rubin Observatory website. Hosts will receive access to a virtual 3D model of the observatory and a virtual tour of Cerro Pachón. They'll also have access to a planetarium-dome-sized feed of the livestream, as well as other planetarium content. Home viewers will be able to see the livestream and images at
Yahoo
15-02-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
What the asteroid with a 1-in-48 chance of hitting Earth in 2032 looks like (images)
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. It might not look like much in this image, but this is the asteroid that has made a major news impact in 2025. That's because this space rock, designated asteroid 2024 YR4, has a 1-in-48 chance of impacting Earth in 2032. For obvious reasons, astronomers are desperate to learn as much as they can about 2024 YR4, estimated to be as large as 177 feet wide (54 meters wide). That's around as wide as Cinderella's Castle in Walt Disney World Florida is image featured here was captured on Feb. 7, 2025 by the 8.1-meter Gemini South telescope that's located on Cerro Pachón, a mountain in the Chilean Andes. At the time the image was taken, the asteroid was around 37 million miles (59.5 million kilometers) from Earth and 130 million miles (209 million kilometers) from the sun. "I find 2024 YT4 to be extremely exciting!" Bryce Bolin, the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center astronomer who helped capture this image, told "Not only because of its notoriety but for the scientific potential of studying such a small asteroid in high detail."Only a few asteroids have been studied like this." "We took 12 200-second long exposures in the Red band and tracked the motion of the asteroid to obtain these images," Bolin explained. "The observations were difficult for three reasons. Firstly, the asteroid was faint, requiring the use of large telescopes to observe." Bolin explained the second difficulty surrounded the fact that 2024 YR4 was observed when the moon was 70% illuminated, meaning there was a considerable increase in sky background light compared to typical darker conditions. This made it more challenging to detect such a faint and distant object. Finally, Bolin added that the asteroid was moving 0.26 arcseconds per minute, which necessitated careful tracking with Gemini South to avoid trailing losses. This isn't the first image of asteroid 2024 YT4. The asteroid was first discovered by the NASA-funded Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System (ATLAS) on Dec. 27, after its discovery, the asteroid raced to the top of NASA's Center for Near Earth Objects Studies (CNEOS) Sentry impact risk table. The asteroid has remained there ever since, with the odds of impact in seven years climbing. Asteroid hunter David Rankin has been tracking 2024 YT4 since its discovery. He recently reassured readers by explaining that the increase in impact odds was expected. Rankin added that those odds are also expected to drop soon when the orbit of this asteroid is better understood. Related Stories: — Earth's mini-moon has finally departed. Will it ever return as a 'second moon?' — Asteroid the size of 3 million elephants zooms past Earth — Astronauts could mine asteroids for food someday, scientists say There are more Gemini South images of 2024 YT4 in the pipeline, but as the asteroid is currently heading away from Earth, it might be a while until we get a really good look at this space rock — from the ground at least. Bolin explained that 2024 YT4 will appear to fade until around mid-March, making it rather difficult to detect from the ground. The asteroid will become visible to ground telescopes in mid-2028 as it reapproaches Earth."Therefore, this is the last chance we have to observe the asteroid from Gemini before 2028," Bolin telescopes may have a little more fortune tracking this space rock until then. The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) is set to join this quest in March of this year.
