Camera core for the future Vera c. Rubin Observatory Her first test photos have been broken, setting a new world record for the largest single shot by a giant digital camera.
Imaging sensor array, including Vera Rubin’s SUV-sized focal plane Digital camera, The Department of Energy (DOE) in California captured 3,200 megapixel images during recent tests at the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory. (“SLAC” is the original name of the feature “Stanford Liner Accelerator Center”.)
SLAC officials said the photos are the largest single-shot images ever taken, so large that a 378 4K ultra-high-definition TV would be needed to show the full size of just one of them. The resolution is so good that the golf ball will be visible from 15 miles (25 kilometers) away.
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However, the first images do not show distant golf balls. The SLAC team, which develops Vera Rubin’s LSST (Space and Time’s Legacy Survey) camera, has focused on nearby onbases, including Romanesco broccoli, which allowed sensors to bind their contents to intricately textured surfaces.
“Taking these images is a great achievement,” said Aaron Ron Rudman, a SLAC scientist responsible for assembling and testing the LSST camera. “With tight specifications, we really pushed the limits of the possibility of taking advantage of every square millimeter of the central plane and maximizing the science we could do with it.”
Like the imaging sensor in you Cellphone The central plane of the LSST camera converts the light emitted or reflected by the object object into electrical signals that produce a digital photo. But the imaging core of the LSST camera is much larger, more complex and more capable than any consumer electronic product.
The newly tested central aircraft is more than 2 feet (0.6 m) wide and is ported by 189 individual sensors, or charge-coupled devices (CCDs). The CCD and its associated electronics are housed in 21 different “rafts”, with subnits about 2 feet tall weighing about 20 lbs. (9 kilograms) and costs about 3 3 million.
These rafts were built at the DOE’s Brookwave National Laboratory in New York and then transferred to SLAC. In January 2020, the SLAC team finished slotting 21 sensor-bearing fuses, plus four other feature fuses, which are not used for imaging, moved to assigned locations in their central plane grid, which took six months.
The rafts are extremely tightly packed to maximize the imaging area of the central plane; SLAC officials said the distance between the CCDs on the neighboring raft is less than the width of five human hairs. And the sensors are fragile, cracking easily if they touch each other.
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“The combination of high stakes and tight endurance makes this project very challenging,” said Hanna Polke, a SLAC mechanical engineer who is a member of the censor-integration team. “But with a versatile team, we nurtured it a lot.”
The newly released images are part of an extensive, ongoing test designed to investigate the central aircraft, which has not yet been installed on the LSST camera. That integration step will happen in the next few months, as if all goes according to plan the addition of a camera lens and other key components.
The camera should be ready for final testing by the middle of next year, SLAC officials said. It will then be sent to the Andes in Chile, Where Vera c. The Rubin Observatory is being built.
Formerly known as the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope, the observatory will use its 27.6-foot-wide (8.4-meter) mirror and 3.2-billion-pixel camera to mark the universe’s 10-year landmark – conduct space and legacy survey space. The time for which the camera is named. The camera will produce a panorama of the southern sky every few nights, collecting a number of astronomical treasures, including about 20 billion different images. Galaxies.
“This data will improve our understanding of how the galaxy has evolved over time and let’s test our models. Dark matter And Shyam .Raja “More deeply and precisely than ever before,” said Steven Ritz, a LSST camera project scientist at the University of California, Santa Cruz.
“From a detailed study of our solar system to the study of distant objects to the edge of the visible universe – the observatory will be a wonderful facility for a wide range of sciences,” Ritz said.
Mike W. Wall is the author of “Out There” (Grand Central Publishing, 2018; illustrated by Carl Tate), a book about the quest for alien life. Follow him on Twitter @Mamildld. Follow us on Twitter @speed.com or Facebook.
