At Chile’s Vera Rubin Observatory, Earth’s Largest Camera Surveys the Sky

10 months ago

The Vera C. Rubin Observatory in Chile houses the world's largest digital camera, which is about the size of a small car.
The camera will create an unparalleled map of the night sky and is expected to have a lifespan of over 10 years.
First public images from the observatory are set to be released on June 23.
The camera is undergoing calibration to measure minute differences in pixel sensitivity.
Each Rubin image contains vast amounts of data, with 10 images comparable to all words published by The New York Times since 1851.
The observatory will produce about 20 terabytes of data nightly, processed in California, France, and Britain.
Specialized software will detect changes in brightness or position by comparing new images with previous data.
The observatory is expected to detect up to 10 million changes nightly, including streaks from satellites like SpaceX Starlink.
Despite challenges like satellite streaks and maintenance, the observatory aims to catalog 20 billion galaxies and 17 billion stars in the Southern sky.

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