Scientists complete construction on 6,600lbs camera with five foot front lens
The largest digital camera ever built, officially named the Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST) Camera, is finally ready to capture a map of the night sky.
Astronomers hope to use the car-sized camera to solve the riddles of dark matter and dark energy over the next decade, The Sun reported.
The Vera C. Rubin Observatory in Chile will house the 3,200-megapixel camera, that weighs 6,600lbs and features a five foot front lens.
The SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory has completed construction on the largest lens ever made for astronomy, and the camera is nearly ready to go online.
"We will soon start producing the greatest movie of all time and the most informative map of the night sky ever assembled," said Željko Ivezić, the Director of Rubin Observatory Construction and University of Washington professor.
The camera boasts a three-foot-wide lens and over 200 custom sensors, enabling it to capture vast visual data with its high resolution.
According to astronomers, hundreds of 4K TVs would be required to show a single, full-size image from the camera.
"Its images are so detailed that it could resolve a golf ball from around 15 miles away, while covering a swath of the sky seven times wider than the full moon," said Aaron Roodman, a SLAC professor and deputy director at the Rubin Observatory.
"These images with billions of stars and galaxies will help unlock the secrets of the universe."
The camera will map the locations and measure the brightness of numerous objects in the night sky, particularly looking for "weak gravitational lensing".