Latest news with #RubinObs
GMA Network
03-07-2025
- Science
- GMA Network
Third-ever confirmed interstellar object blazing through Solar System
Distant galaxies are seen in an image produced by the Vera C. Rubin Observatory, on Pachon Hill, Coquimbo Region, Chile, June 18, 2025. RubinObs/NOIRLab/SLAC/NSF/DOE/AURA/Handout via REUTERS PARIS, France - Astronomers on Wednesday confirmed the discovery of an interstellar object racing through our Solar System -- only the third ever spotted, though scientists suspect many more may slip past unnoticed. The visitor from the stars, designated 3I/Atlas, is likely the largest yet detected, and has been classified as a comet, or cosmic snowball. "It looks kind of fuzzy," Peter Veres, an astronomer with the International Astronomical Union's Minor Planet Center, which was responsible for the official confirmation, told AFP. "It seems that there is some gas around it, and I think one or two telescopes reported a very short tail." Originally known as A11pl3Z before it was confirmed to be of interstellar origin, the object poses no threat to Earth, said Richard Moissl, head of planetary defense at the European Space Agency. "It will fly deep through the Solar System, passing just inside the orbit of Mars," but will not hit our neighboring planet, he told AFP. Excited astronomers are still refining their calculations, but the object appears to be zooming more than 60 kilometers (37 miles) a second. This would mean it is not bound by the Sun's orbit, unlike objects that remain within the solar system. Its trajectory also "means it's not orbiting our star, but coming from interstellar space and flying off to there again," Moissl said. "We think that probably these little ice balls get formed associated with star systems," added Jonathan McDowell, an astronomer at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. "And then as another star passes by, tugs on the ice ball, frees it out. It goes rogue, wanders through the galaxy, and now this one is just passing us." A Chile based observatory that is part of the NASA-funded ATLAS survey first discovered the object on Tuesday. Professional and amateur astronomers across the world then searched through past telescope data, tracing its trajectory back to at least June 14. The object is currently estimated to be roughly 10-20 kilometers wide, Moissl said, which would make it the largest interstellar interloper ever detected. But the object could be smaller if it is made out of ice, which reflects more light. Veres said the object will continue to brighten as it nears the Sun, bending slightly under the pull of gravity, and is expected to reach its closest point -- perihelion -- on 29 October. It will then recede and exit the Solar System over the next few years. Our third visitor This marks only the third time humanity has detected an object entering the solar system from the stars. The first, 'Oumuamua, was discovered in 2017. It was so strange that at least one prominent scientist became convinced it was an alien vessel -- though this has since been contradicted by further research. Our second interstellar visitor, 2I/Borisov, was spotted in 2019. There is no reason to suspect an artificial origin for 3I/Atlas, but teams around the world are now racing to answer key questions about things like its shape, composition, and rotation. Mark Norris, an astronomer at the UK's University of Central Lancashire, told AFP that the new object appears to be "moving considerably faster than the other two extrasolar objects that we previously discovered." The object is currently roughly around the distance from Jupiter away from Earth, Norris said. Norris pointed to modelling estimating that there could be as many as 10,000 interstellar objects drifting through the Solar System at any given time, though most would be smaller than the newly discovered object. If true, this suggests that the newly online Vera C. Rubin Observatory in Chile could soon be finding these dim interstellar visitors every month, Norris said. Moissl said it is not feasible to send a mission into space to intercept the new object. Still, these visitors offer scientists a rare chance to study something outside of our Solar System. For example, if we detected precursors of life such as amino acids on such an object, it would give us "a lot more confidence that the conditions for life exist in other star systems," Norris said. — Agence France-Presse
GMA Network
27-06-2025
- Science
- GMA Network
Chile observatory captures the universe with 3,200-megapixel camera
Distant galaxies are seen in an image produced by the Vera C. Rubin Observatory, on Pachon Hill, Coquimbo Region, Chile, June 18, 2025. RubinObs/NOIRLab/SLAC/NSF/DOE/AURA/Handout via REUTERS SANTIAGO - Chile's Vera C. Rubin Observatory, which boasts the world's largest digital camera, has begun displaying its first images of the cosmos, allowing astronomers to figure out how the solar system formed and even whether an asteroid poses a threat to Earth. Located on Pachon Hill in the northern region of Coquimbo, the 8.4-meter (27-1/2-foot) telescope has a 3,200-megapixel camera feeding a powerful data processing system. "It's really going to change and challenge the way people work with their data," said William O'Mullane, a project manager focused on data at Vera Rubin. The observatory detected over 2,100 previously unseen asteroids in 10 hours of observations, focusing on a small area of the visible sky. Its ground-based and space-based peers discover in total some 20,000 asteroids a year. O'Mullane said the observatory would allow astronomers to collect huge amounts of data quickly and make unexpected finds. "Rather than the usual couple of observations and writing an (academic) paper. No, I'll give you a million galaxies. I'll give you a million stars or a billion even, because we have them: 20 billion galaxy measurements," he said. The center is named after American astronomer Vera C. Rubin, a pioneer in finding conclusive evidence of the existence of large amounts of invisible material known as dark matter. Each night, Rubin will take some 1,000 images of the southern hemisphere sky, letting it cover the entire southern sky every three or four nights. The darkest skies above the arid Atacama Desert make Chile one of the best places worldwide for astronomical observation. "The number of alerts the telescope will send every night is equivalent to the inboxes of 83,000 people. It's impossible for someone to look at that one by one," said astrophysicist Francisco Foster. "We're going to have to use artificial intelligence tools." — Reuters
Straits Times
27-06-2025
- Science
- Straits Times
Chile observatory captures the universe with 3,200-megapixel camera
The open star cluster Messier 21 is seen in an image produced by the Vera C. Rubin Observatory, on Pachon Hill, Coquimbo Region, Chile June 12, 2025. RubinObs/NOIRLab/SLAC/NSF/DOE/AURA/Handout via REUTERS Globular cluster NGC 6544 is seen in an image produced by the Vera C. Rubin Observatory, on Pachon Hill, Coquimbo Region, Chile June 12, 2025. RubinObs/NOIRLab/SLAC/NSF/DOE/AURA/Handout via REUTERS The Trifid Nebula is seen in an image produced by the Vera C. Rubin Observatory, on Pachon Hill, Coquimbo Region, Chile June 12, 2025. RubinObs/NOIRLab/SLAC/NSF/DOE/AURA/Handout via REUTERS Distant galaxies are seen in an image produced by the Vera C. Rubin Observatory, on Pachon Hill, Coquimbo Region, Chile June 18, 2025. RubinObs/NOIRLab/SLAC/NSF/DOE/AURA/Handout via REUTERS The Trifid and Lagoon Nebulae are seen in an image produced by the Vera C. Rubin Observatory, on Pachon Hill, Coquimbo Region, Chile June 12, 2025. RubinObs/NOIRLab/SLAC/NSF/DOE/AURA/Handout via REUTERS SANTIAGO - Chile's Vera C. Rubin Observatory, which boasts the world's largest digital camera, has begun displaying its first images of the cosmos, allowing astronomers to figure out how the solar system formed and even whether an asteroid poses a threat to Earth. Located on Pachon Hill in the northern region of Coquimbo, the 8.4-meter (27-1/2-foot) telescope has a 3,200-megapixel camera feeding a powerful data processing system. "It's really going to change and challenge the way people work with their data," said William O'Mullane, a project manager focused on data at Vera Rubin. The observatory detected over 2,100 previously unseen asteroids in 10 hours of observations, focusing on a small area of the visible sky. Its ground-based and space-based peers discover in total some 20,000 asteroids a year. O'Mullane said the observatory would allow astronomers to collect huge amounts of data quickly and make unexpected finds. "Rather than the usual couple of observations and writing an (academic) paper. No, I'll give you a million galaxies. I'll give you a million stars or a billion even, because we have them: 20 billion galaxy measurements," he said. The center is named after American astronomer Vera C. Rubin, a pioneer in finding conclusive evidence of the existence of large amounts of invisible material known as dark matter. Each night, Rubin will take some 1,000 images of the southern hemisphere sky, letting it cover the entire southern sky every three or four nights. The darkest skies above the arid Atacama Desert make Chile one of the best places worldwide for astronomical observation. "The number of alerts the telescope will send every night is equivalent to the inboxes of 83,000 people. It's impossible for someone to look at that one by one," said astrophysicist Francisco Foster. "We're going to have to use artificial intelligence tools." REUTERS Join ST's Telegram channel and get the latest breaking news delivered to you.
New York Post
23-06-2025
- Science
- New York Post
Largest camera ever built captures eye-popping images of millions of distant stars and galaxies
The first images from the Vera C. Rubin Observatory showed off a breathtaking preview of its capabilities — capturing millions of stars and galaxies light-years from Earth, along with thousands of never-before-seen asteroids. The observatory — perched atop Cerro Pachón in the Chilean Andes Mountains — will train its high-powered 27.5-foot Simonyi Survey Telescope at the night sky over the next decade to give astronomers an unprecedented look at the cosmos. 3 The approximately $810 million Vera C. Rubin observatory took nearly two decades to complete. RubinObs/NOIRLab/SLAC/NSF/DOE/AURA/T. Matsopoulos Advertisement The newly released images were compiled from around 10 hours of test observations, showing swirling clouds of pink and golden dust that make up the Trifid nebula and a large cluster of galaxies known as the Virgo cluster — both located thousands of light-years away. In all, the video made from the first 1,100 test images shows around 10 million distant galaxies in the camera's wide-view lens, a tiny fraction of the approximately 20 billion galaxies the Rubin observatory is hoping to capture over the course of its work. 'NSF-DOE Rubin Observatory will capture more information about our universe than all optical telescopes throughout history combined,' National Science Foundation Chief of Staff Brian Stone told CNN. Advertisement The test images also uncovered 2,104 asteroids that had never before been seen in our solar system, including seven 'near-Earth' asteroids — those within about 30 million miles of Earth's orbit. Scientists at the observatory said none of them pose any threat to our planet. Images of the asteroids are expected to be shared with the public on Monday. Typical telescopes based in space or on the ground are capable of spying around 20,000 asteroids each year, while the Rubin Observatory is expected to discover millions of the rocky space objects in just the next two years alone, according to the US National Science Foundation, which funded the observatory along with the US Department of Energy. Advertisement 3 First images included the Trifid and Lagoon nebulas, both thousands of light-years from Earth. AP The primary objective of the $810 million observatory, which took approximately 20 years to build, is to create an ultra-high-definition movie of the images it captures over the next 10 years known as the Legacy Survey of Space and Time. The resulting time-lapse compilation will show details like comets and asteroids zooming by, exploding stars and distant galaxies transforming over time. 3 Another image captured showed a large cluster of galaxies called the Virgo cluster, representing just a fraction of the 20 billion galaxies the observatory is expected to image over the next 10 years. AP Advertisement '[Rubin] will enable us to explore galaxies, stars in the Milky Way, objects in the solar system, and all in a truly new way. Since we take images of the night sky so quickly and so often, (it) will detect millions of changing objects literally every night,' Aaron Roodman, a professor of particle physics and astrophysics at Stanford University, told the outlet. The observatory's unique capabilities will help other powerful telescopes direct their focus, acting as a 'discovery machine' to discover other interesting areas of the universe that warrant a closer look. The telescope's namesake, Vera C. Rubin, is considered one of the most influential female astronomers of all time. She is credited with providing some of the first evidence proving the existence of dark matter, the mysterious substance that makes up much of our universe.
