Crews at the Department of Energy’s SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory have taken the first 3,200-megapixel digital photos – the largest ever taken in a single shot – with an extraordinary array of imaging sensors that will become the heart and soul of the future camera of Vera C. Rubin Observatory.
The images are so large that it would take 378 4K ultra-high-definition TV screens to display one of them in full size, and their resolution is so high that you could see a golf ball from about 15 miles away. These and other properties will soon drive unprecedented astrophysical research.
The complete focal plane of the future LSST Camera is more than 2 feet wide, by capturing light and converting it into electrical signals that produce digital images.
Now that the team at the Observatory has confirmed the focal plane is working, it will be placed inside a cryostat—the plane needs to be kept at -150 °F to function. The cryostat, in turn, will be inserted into the main camera body.
Camera contains 189 individual sensors, or charge-coupled devices (CCDs), that each bring 16 megapixels to the table – about the same number as the imaging sensors of most modern digital cameras.
Individual imaging sensors and supporting electronics of the LSST Camera’s focal plane are packaged into units, called “rafts.” There are two different types of units: 21 square rafts (center), each containing nine sensors, will produce the images for Rubin Observatory’s science program. An additional four specialty rafts (left) with only three sensors each will be used for camera focusing and synchronizing the telescope with Earth’s rotation.
The focal plane has some truly extraordinary properties. Not only does it contain a whopping 3.2 billion pixels, but its pixels are also very small – about 10 microns wide – and the focal plane itself is extremely flat, varying by no more than a tenth of the width of a human hair. This allows the camera to produce sharp images in very high resolution. At more than 2 feet wide, the focal plane is enormous compared to the 1.4-inch-wide imaging sensor of a full-frame consumer camera and large enough to capture a portion of the sky about the size of 40 full moons.
Next, the sensor array will be integrated into the world’s largest digital camera, currently under construction at SLAC. Once installed at Rubin Observatory in Chile, the camera will produce panoramic images of the complete Southern sky – one panorama every few nights for 10 years.
Using the LSST Camera, the observatory will create the largest astronomical movie of all time and shed light on some of the biggest mysteries of the universe, including dark matter and dark energy.
The completion of the LSST Camera focal plane and its successful tests is a huge victory by the camera team that will enable Rubin Observatory to deliver next-generation astronomical science.
The camera will explore cosmic mysteries of Space and Time.