Latest news with #LegacySurveyofSpaceandTime
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Science
- Yahoo
A new observatory is assembling the most complete time-lapse record of the night sky ever
On 23 June 2025, the world will get a look at the first images from one of the most powerful telescopes ever built: the Vera C. Rubin Observatory. Perched high in the Chilean Andes, the observatory will take hundreds of images of the southern hemisphere sky, every night for 10 years. In doing so, it will create the most complete time-lapse record of our Universe ever assembled. This scientific effort is known as the Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST). Rather than focusing on small patches of sky, the Rubin Observatory will scan the entire visible southern sky every few nights. Scientists will use this rolling deep-sky snapshot to track supernovae (exploding stars), asteroids, black holes, and galaxies as they evolve and change in real time. This is astronomy not as a static snapshot, but as a cosmic story unfolding night by night. At the heart of the observatory lies a remarkable piece of engineering: a digital camera the size of a small car and weighing over three tonnes. With a staggering 3,200 megapixels, each image it captures has enough detail to spot a golf ball from 25km away. Get your news from actual experts, straight to your inbox. Sign up to our daily newsletter to receive all The Conversation UK's latest coverage of news and research, from politics and business to the arts and sciences. Each image is so detailed that it would take hundreds of ultra-high-definition TV screens to display it in full. To capture the universe in colour, the camera uses enormous filters — each about the size of a dustbin lid — that allow through different types of light, from ultraviolet to near-infrared. The observatory was first proposed in 2001, and construction at the Cerro Pachón ridge site in northern Chile began in April 2015. The first observations with a low-resolution test camera were carried out in October 2024, setting up the first images using the main camera, to be unveiled in June. The observatory is designed to tackle some of astronomy's biggest questions. For instance, by measuring how galaxies cluster and move, the Rubin Observatory will help scientists investigate the nature of dark energy, the mysterious force driving the accelerating expansion of the Universe. As a primary goal, it will map the large-scale structure of the Universe and investigate dark matter, the invisible form of matter that makes up 27% of the cosmos. Dark matter acts as the 'scaffolding' of the universe, a web-like structure that provides a framework for the formation of galaxies. The observatory is named after the US astronomer Dr Vera Rubin, whose groundbreaking work uncovered the first strong evidence for dark matter – the very phenomenon this telescope will explore in unprecedented detail. As a woman in a male-dominated field, Rubin overcame numerous obstacles and remained a tireless advocate for equality in science. She died in 2016 at the age of 88, and her name on this observatory is a tribute not only to her science, but to her perseverance and her legacy of inclusion. Closer to home, Rubin will help find and track millions of asteroids and other objects that come near Earth – helping warn astronomers of any potential collisions. The observatory will also monitor stars that change in brightness, which can reveal planets orbiting them. And it will capture rare and fleeting cosmic events, such as the collision of very dense objects called neutron stars, which release sudden bursts of light and ripples in space known as gravitational waves. What makes this observatory particularly exciting is not just what we expect it to find, but what we can't yet imagine. Many astronomical breakthroughs have come from chance: strange flashes in the night sky and puzzling movements of objects. Rubin's massive, continuous data stream could reveal entirely new classes of objects or unknown physical processes. But capturing this 'movie of the universe' depends on something we often take for granted: dark skies. One of the growing challenges facing astronomers is light pollution from satellite mega-constellations – a group of many satellites working together. These satellites reflect sunlight and can leave bright streaks across telescope images, potentially interfering with the very discoveries Rubin is designed to make. While software can detect and remove some of these trails, doing so adds complexity, cost and can degrade the data. Fortunately, solutions are already being explored. Rubin Observatory staff are developing simulation tools to predict and reduce satellite interference. They are also working with satellite operators to dim or reposition spacecraft. These efforts are essential – not just for Rubin, but for the future of space science more broadly. Rubin is a collaboration between the US National Science Foundation and the Department of Energy, with global partners contributing to data processing and scientific analysis. Importantly, much of the data will be publicly available, offering researchers, students and citizen scientists around the world the chance to make discoveries of their own. The 'first-look' event, which will unveil the first images from the observatory, will be livestreamed in English and Spanish, and celebrations are planned at venues around the world. For astronomers, this is a once-in-a-generation moment – a project that will transform our view of the universe, spark public imagination and generate scientific insights for decades to come. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. Noelia Noël does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Belfast Telegraph
5 days ago
- General
- Belfast Telegraph
New facility to detect millions of new solar system objects, say NI-led astronomers
The brand new facility at NSF–DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory in Chile will revolutionise the world's knowledge of the solar system's 'small bodies': asteroids, comets and other minor planets. At the heart of the Rubin Observatory is the fastest moving telescope equipped with the world's largest digital camera. A single image from the telescope covers a patch of sky roughly 45 times the area of the full moon. This 'wide-fast-deep' system will spend the next ten years observing the night sky to produce the Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST). Astronomers say the system will provide unprecedented time-lapse footage of the cosmos and a powerful dataset with which to map the solar system. New open-source software has also been created to predict what discoveries are likely to be made, with a series of papers describing the software soon to be published by The Astronomical Journal. The group of astronomers has been led by Dr Meg Schwamb of Queen's University Belfast's School of Mathematics and Physics. Dr Schwamb said the world's knowledge of what objects fill the Earth's solar system 'is about to expand exponentially and rapidly'. QUB PhD student Joe Murtagh is one of the lead authors of the prediction studies and among those whose papers have been submitted to the Astronomical Journal. He said: 'It's very exciting – we expect that millions of new solar system objects will be detected and most of these will be picked up in the first few years of sky survey.' "With the LSST catalogue of solar system objects, our work shows that it will be like going from black-and-white television to brilliant colour.' Beyond just finding these new small bodies, Rubin Observatory will observe them multiple times in different optical filters, revealing their surface colours. Past solar system surveys, typically observed only in a single filter. To forecast which small bodies will be discovered, the team built Sorcha, the first end-to-end simulator that ingests Rubin's planned observing schedule. It applies assumptions on how Rubin Observatory observes and detects astronomical sources in its images with the best model of what the solar system and its small body reservoirs look like today. The team's simulations show that Rubin will map 127,000 near-Earth objects such as asteroids and comets whose orbits cross or approach the planet. It will also study over five million main-belt asteroids and 109,000 Jupiter Trojans, bodies which share Jupiter's orbit at stable 'Lagrange' points. Some 37,000 trans-Neptunian objects, which are residents of the distant Kuiper Belt, will also be mapped, along with around 1,500 to 2,000 Centaurs. The Sorcha code is open-source and freely available with the simulated catalogues, animations, and pre-prints of the papers publicly available at News Catch Up - Tuesday 3 June By making these resources available, the Sorcha team has enabled researchers worldwide to refine their tools and be ready for the flood of LSST data that Rubin will generate, advancing the understanding of the small bodies that illuminate the solar system like never before. Rubin Observatory is scheduled to unveil its first spectacular imagery at its 'First Look' event on June 23, offering the world an early glimpse of the survey's power. Full science operations are slated to begin later this year.
Yahoo
12-03-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Who was Vera Rubin? Dark matter astronomer's legacy continues through new observatory
CERRO PACHON, Chile - Driving up the mountain road to reach the U.S. National Science Foundation's newest observatory in Chile, which will begin observations later this year, astronomer Beth Willman was delighted to see a sign. "It says 'Vera C. Rubin Observatory this way,' and it was a simple but powerful moment for me to realize it was really there," Willman said. A quick internet search will reveal why having a woman's name on a $571 million science facility is a milestone. There are no others like it, and no one like Rubin. "In the back of my head, I had wanted the National Lab to be named after Vera Rubin because of her incredible leadership and legacy. And I was thrilled to hear that work was already ongoing to name what is now the Vera C. Rubin Observatory after her," Willman said. Willman was the deputy director of the Rubin construction project and now serves as the executive director of the LSST Alliance, a nonprofit dedicated to the Legacy Survey of Space and Time. The Observatory's LSST is the world's largest digital camera, and it will create the largest astronomical movie yet of the southern hemisphere sky over 10 years. In March, the LSST was installed at the mountaintop observatory in Chile, and the facility has entered the final stages of testing before operations begin in the coming months. The U.S. Department of Energy and National Science Foundation-funded facility, the Vera C. Rubin Observatory, is named after the astronomer credited with the first evidence of dark matter. Many in the scientific community still believe she was overlooked for the Nobel Prize. Rubin died in 2016 at 88 years old. "When I think of Vera Rubin, I think of breaking scientific barriers, I think of directly amplifying the future of scientists through training and mentoring future scientists, and I think of the fact that she had to break cultural barriers in order to break scientific barriers," Willman said. Rubin's work in the 1970s led to the first evidence that the universe has something we still don't know what it is, known as dark matter. Fifty years later, scientists know about 80% of the universe is made of dark matter. "She did that by pioneering studies of galaxies. In order to do her pioneer studies of galaxies she had to go to observatories where women hadn't been permitted to go before," Willman said. Rubin made these discoveries while raising four young children, something Willman relates to: balancing work in a male-dominated field and being a mother. Telescope Used To Study Mysteries Of The Universe Releases First Images In Stunning Detail In 2010, Willman brought her students from Haverford College to listen to Rubin speak at Bryn Mawr College, where she could ask her about this balancing act. "I took my whole lab of students over there to hear her speak as really a role model and a pioneering example of how somebody can be the leader of their field and change the way we understand the universe while also being a parent," Willman said. At the time, as a mom to an 18-month-old daughter, it was top of mind for Willman. "She said it was about her own support resources that she had in place that in order to accomplish, you look around your community, your family for the support that you need," Willman recalls. "I was so fascinated by that response. I don't know what I expected. I expected some, you know, superhero swashbuckling stories. She was just a humble and powerful and brilliant woman, very practical and down to Earth." All four of Rubin's children went on to be scientists, her son, Allan Rubin told the NSF. The world will soon hear Vera Rubin's name a lot more for a few reasons. Her face will be on a new quarter released this June, right around the time Rubin Observatory plans to release the first images. In the decades to come, budding scientists will credit discoveries and new findings to the Vera C. Rubin Observatory in Chile, building on the work of a celebrated astronomer who sought to inspire others when women didn't have their own restrooms in some science article source: Who was Vera Rubin? Dark matter astronomer's legacy continues through new observatory
Yahoo
30-01-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
To decode dark energy, the Rubin Observatory will find millions of exploding vampire stars
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. The Vera C. Rubin Observatory will soon open its eyes to the cosmos, and scientists predict it will detect millions of vampire stars exploding as they feed on their stellar companions. Currently under construction on the Chilean mountain Cerro Pachón, the Rubin Observatory is expected to begin its 10-year Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST) later this year. An influx of data during this time, from so-called Type Ia supernovas, will be a boon to scientists investigating the mystery of dark energy, the unknown force that is driving the acceleration of the universe's expansion. The light output of exploding white dwarf stars, which are the stellar corpses of stars with masses around that of the sun, is so uniform that astronomers can use it to measure distances. This uniformity means Type Ia supernovas are often referred to as "standard candles," serving as a vital rung on the "cosmic distance ladder." Usually, it is difficult to tell if an astronomical body, like a star, is bright because it emits lots of light or because it sits closer to Earth. The fact that Type Ia supernovas emit a standard amount of light, however, means that astronomers can look at their brightnesses and colors and combine this with information about their host galaxies to calculate their true distances. This, in turn, can reveal how much the universe has expanded because scientists can create milestones for certain distances in the universe. "The large volume of data from Rubin will give us a sample of all kinds of Type Ia supernovas at a range of distances and in many different types of galaxies," Anais Möller, a team member of the Rubin/LSST Dark Energy Science Collaboration, said in a statement. White dwarfs are born when stars with sun-like masses exhaust their fuel supplies needed for nuclear fusion reactions within their cores and thereby collapse under the influence of their own gravity. Losing a great deal of mass as their outer layers are shed, these dead stellar cores end up under the so-called Chandrasekhar limit of around 1.4 solar masses. This means they can't go supernova. The sun will undergo this process in around 5 billion years, ending its life as a lonely, cooling stellar ember. However, if the white dwarf progenitor star exists in a binary with another star, this stellar corpse can begin vampirically stripping material from its companion. That process will continue until the white dwarf has amassed enough stolen matter to creep over the Chandrasekhar this critical mass, white dwarfs erupt in Type Ia supernovas that usually obliterate them, though these explosions can, in rare cases, leave a shattered "zombie star" remnant. Astronomers have spotted thousands of these explosive events. The problem, however, is that seeing a Type Ia supernova once or even twice isn't enough to build a picture of how its light varies over time. Yet, repeat viewings are difficult because these explosions appear without warning in the sky and then fade will scan the sky over the southern hemisphere every night for 10 years, covering the entire hemisphere approximately every few nights hunting for objects with changing brightness. This rapid detection ability will make Rubin adept at spotting Type Ia supernovas and allowing astronomers to investigate them before they fade data regarding more Type Ia supernovas located at different distances from Earth will allow scientists to build a better model of how dark energy is influencing the cosmos. Type Ia supernovas have been intrinsic to the concept of dark energy since 1998 when two separate teams of researchers used these white dwarf eruptions to determine that the universe was expanding at an accelerating rate. Since then, scientists have determined that dark energy dominates the universe, accounting for around 68% of the cosmic energy and matter budget. However, this wasn't always the case. Whatever dark energy is, it seems to have only "kicked in" when the universe was between 9 billion and 10 billion years old. Before this, the universe had been dominated by matter — and before that, it had been ruled by the energy of the Big Bang. The most robust model we have of the evolution of the universe, the Lambda Cold Dark Matter (LCDM) model, suggests that dark energy is constant. However, recent results from the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) have suggested that isn't the case, hinting that the strength of dark energy is changing. Rubin and the LSST could help resolve this issue by providing a larger sample of Type Ia supernovas over varying distances than scientists have ever before had at their fingertips."The universe expanding is like a rubber band being stretched. If dark energy is not constant, that would be like stretching the rubber band by different amounts at different points," Möller continued. "I think in the next decade, we will be able to constrain whether dark energy is constant or evolving with cosmic time. "Rubin will allow us to do that with Type Ia supernovas.' Related Stories: — How the Rubin observatory could detect thousands of 'failed stars' — Rubin Observatory aces 1st image tests, gets ready to use world's largest digital camera — 'Vampire stars' explode after eating too much — AI could help reveal why Astronomers will need to prepare themselves for a data deluge when Rubin begins scanning the sky over the southern horizon. It is estimated that Rubin will generate up to 10 million alerts embedded within 20 terabytes of data every night. Software systems will process these alerts before being fired out to astronomers across the globe. Among the supernovas in the data will be other transient events such as variable stars and kilonovas, the violent collision between extreme dense stellar remnants called neutron stars. "Because of the large volumes of data, we can't do science the same way we did before," Möller concluded. "Rubin is a generational shift. And our responsibility is developing the methods that will be used by the next generation."
