On Cerro Pachón, at 2.700 meters above sea level in the Chilean desert, something extraordinary is about to come into operation. Vera Rubin It is not just an observatory: it is a technologically advanced window on the universe, ready to show us what no instrument has ever been able to see before.
An unprecedented view
The most impressive feature of the Vera Rubin is its 3.200 megapixel digital camera, the largest ever built for astronomy. With the dimensions of a car and a weight of 3.000 kilograms, this instrument is the real beating heart of the observatory.
In a single 30-second exposure, the Vera C. Rubin camera It can capture details of more than 100.000 galaxies, many of which are invisible to other instruments. The sensitivity is so high that it could theoretically detect a golf ball from a distance of 24 kilometers.
The area of sky covered in each shot is equivalent to about 40 times the surface of the full Moon, an unprecedented field of view for a telescope of this power.
Vera Rubin, innovative design at the service of science
The optical design of the Vera Rubin is distinguished by its three-mirror configuration. As explained Sandrine Thomas, deputy director of the observatory construction, the primary mirror is composed of two surfaces with different curvatures.
The outer section, 8,4 metres wide, captures light from the depths of the cosmos and reflects it onto a 3,4-metre secondary mirror positioned above it. The light is then bounced off the inner section of the primary, which acts as a tertiary mirror, before reaching the camera.
This compact configuration allows the telescope to be both powerful and agile, moving quickly to capture approximately 1.000 images each night.
A river of data arrives from the cosmos
Every night, The Vera Rubin will generate approximately 20 terabytes of data that will be transmitted via fiber optic cables to processing centers around the world.. As he explains Anais Moller of Swinburne University of Technology, this data will be analyzed using machine learning techniques to identify interesting phenomena.
The aim of the Sustainable Islands It should detect about 10 million changes in the sky each night. We will have “real-time” updates on events such as supernova explosions, stellar mergers, or the passage of massive objects in front of other celestial bodies.
A new chapter in the exploration of the solar system
The Vera Rubin, in essence, promises to completely revolutionize our understanding of the solar system. It is expected that will increase the number of known asteroids and comets by a factor of 10 to 100, with particular attention to objects potentially dangerous for the Earth (at the moment we know that we will have no problems for the next 1000 years, who knows later).
Furthermore, will catalog 40.000 new icy bodies in the Kuiper Belt, a largely unexplored region beyond the orbit of Neptune. These discoveries will help scientists better understand the structure and history of our solar system. But it didn't end there.
The Hunt for Dark Matter
One of the most ambitious missions of the observatory is the study of the dark matter. The Vera Rubin will map about 20 billion previously unknown galaxies, tracing their arrangement in the filamentary structures known as the cosmic web.
As emphasized Christian Aganze ofStanford University, the astronomical community's enthusiasm for this instrument is unanimous. The distribution of galaxies in the cosmic web is directly influenced by the gravitational force of dark matter, and these data could provide crucial clues about its nature.
Vera Rubin is the near future of astronomy
The Vera Rubin will take us to the next crucial stage in the history of observational astronomy. Combining an extremely wide field of view with unprecedented sensitivity, this observatory will give astronomers a completely new view of the universe.
His systematic observations of the night sky will create, in Möller's words, "a huge video of the southern sky for 10 years", allowing us to study the evolution of the cosmos in unprecedented detail. Dear astronomers, physicists, scientists, what can we say: enjoy the viewing, and let us know!
