Rubin Observatory's First LSST Camera Image Reveals 500,000 Galaxies in a Single Shot
Rubin Observatory's first LSST Camera release: 500k galaxies in the COSMOS field
The NSF–DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory has released its first deep image from the 3.2-gigapixel LSST Camera, capturing over 500,000 galaxies and 50,000 stars in the well-studied COSMOS field. This image, created from hundreds of stacked observations, offers an unusually clear view of distant galaxies, some billions of light-years away. It marks the start of Rubin's Early Data Preview 2, providing a glimpse of the survey's potential to study cosmic evolution and transient phenomena.
The COSMOS deep image is just the beginning for Rubin in this region.
- toufka
The image size of this camera is unbelievably huge in its coverage.
Most telescopes take pictures of objects - this one takes pictures of the entire sky. And will do so in a time-lapse fashion for 10 years.
It's simultaneously more in line with a human's experience than an obscure wavelength of tiny object not visible to the naked eye - it takes a high-resolution picture that's similar to what you'd see if you look at the sky. But it's also profoundly grand beyond a human's experience because of just how much stuff is collected.
- irickt
Viewer from Aladin Sky Atlas