After working towards this goal for over twenty years, engineers and scientists at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC), a U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) national research laboratory, are celebrating the completion of the Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST) Camera. The DOE and National Science Foundation (NSF) funded Vera C. Rubin Observatory will use the 3,200 megapixel camera to assist researchers in viewing our universe in stunning detail. It is hoped and anticipated that this vital new tool will help researchers in their quest to better understand dark energy, which is driving the accelerating expansion of the universe. It is presently understood that Dark Matter makes up around eighty-five percent (85%) of the matter in the known universe.
But researchers also have plans to utilize the data to better understand our own solar system, the changing night sky and our own Milky Way Galaxy. Learn more about this incredible step forward including quotes from a Professor of the University of Washington and Director of the Rubin Observatory Construction here.