Chile to Install World’s Largest Astronomy Camera on Edge of Atacama Desert

Chile to Install World’s Largest Astronomy Camera on Edge of Atacama Desert
The 3200-megapixel LSST digital astronomy camera, the highest-resolution camera in the world, inside Vera C. Rubin Observatory venue, at Cerro Pachon area, in Coquimbo region, Chile, on May 18, 2024. Olivier Bonin/SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory/Handout via Reuters
Reuters
Updated:
0:00

SANTIAGO—With a resolution above 3.2 gigapixels, a nearly three-ton weight and the ambitious task of carrying out an unprecedented decade-long exploration, the largest digital camera ever built for optical astronomy is ready to be installed under the clear skies of northern Chile.

The pieces required to assemble the Vera C. Rubin Observatory—which includes a ground-based telescope and the camera—traveled in several vehicles to the summit of Cerro Pachón in the Coquimbo region, on the edge of the Atacama desert, some 565 kilometers north of Santiago.