San Francisco Frontiers - Vera Rubin observatory reveals stunning first images

More than two decades in the making, the $800 million US-funded telescope sits atop Cerro Pachon in central Chile, where dark skies and dry air provide ideal conditions for observing the cosmos.

One debut image is a composite of 678 exposures taken over seven hours, capturing the Trifid and Lagoon Nebulae -- both several thousand light-years from Earth -- glowing in vivid pinks against orange-red backdrops.

It reveals these birth places of stars in unprecedented detail, with previously faint or invisible features now clearly visible.

Another, dubbed "The Cosmic Treasure Chest," shows the universe "teeming with stars and galaxies -- the seemingly empty black pockets of space between stars in the night sky when you look at it with unaided eyes, are transformed here into these glittering tapestries," said Zeljko Ivezic, director of Rubin construction.

Spiral, elliptical, and clustered galaxies appear in vivid reds, blues, and oranges. These colors reveal key details such as distance and size with unmatched precision, helping scientists better understand the universe's expansion history.

The colors don't directly match what the naked eye would see, explained scientist Federica Bianco, since the telescope captures a far broader range of wavelengths. Instead, they are representational: infrared is mapped to red to represent cooler objects, while ultraviolet is mapped to blue and indicates warmer ones.

- 10-year flagship project -

An interactive version of the image is now available on the Rubin Observatory's website.

"One of the things that is very fun is that if you zoom in and you look at one of the fuzzy galaxies there, you might be the first person to be paying attention to that fuzzy blob," said Clare Higgs, education and public outreach science lead.

The observatory features an advanced 8.4-meter telescope and the largest digital camera ever built, supported by a powerful data system transferring 20 terabytes each night.

Roughly the size of a car, the camera captures 3,200-megapixel images. It would take 400 ultra-high-definition televisions stacked together to view a single Rubin image at full resolution.

Later this year, the observatory will launch its flagship project, the Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST). Over the next decade, it will scan the night sky nightly, detecting even the subtlest changes with unmatched precision.

Named after pioneering American astronomer Vera C. Rubin — whose research provided the first conclusive evidence for dark matter — the observatory continues her legacy by making dark matter a central focus of its mission.

Dark energy, an equally mysterious and immensely powerful force, is believed to drive the accelerating expansion of the universe. Together, dark matter and dark energy are thought to make up 95 percent of the cosmos, yet their true nature remains unknown.

"By observing up to 20 billion galaxies, we'll study how light from those distant galaxies has reached us — and nearly every galaxy's light has been bent by the gravitational interaction of dark matter that pervades the universe," said scientist Aaron Roodman. This, he added, will help illuminate these cosmic mysteries.

A joint initiative of the US National Science Foundation and Department of Energy, the observatory is also considered one of the most powerful tools ever built for planetary defense.

In just 10 hours of observation, Rubin discovered 2,104 previously unknown asteroids in our solar system, including seven near-Earth objects -- none of which pose a threat. All other ground- and space-based observatories combined discover about 20,000 new asteroids per year.

- Chilean pride -

Chile hosts telescopes from more than 30 countries, including some of the most advanced astronomical instruments in the world — among them the ALMA Observatory, the most powerful radio telescope on Earth.

Cerro Tololo Observatory helped achieve the landmark discovery of the universe's accelerating expansion -- a breakthrough that earned the 2011 Nobel Prize in Physics.

Another major project, the Extremely Large Telescope, is slated to begin operations in 2027 and promises to probe previously unreachable cosmic distances.

G.Collins--SFF