This picture shows technicians setting up a huge new telescope at the Vera C. Rubin Observatory in Chile. The assembly began with a sensitive mirror, which was installed vertically on the telescope mount at the end of July 2024 at great expense. The polished and silver-coated convex mirror made of special glass has a diameter of 3.50 meters and is ten centimeters thick. This makes it one of the largest mirrors ever made. The component also includes various electronics and sensors.
This is the first of many special components that, after years of planning and construction, will together form the wide-field optics of the so-called Simonyi Survey Telescope. Another mirror with a diameter of 8.40 meters and a camera still need to be installed. This is to be the largest digital camera in the world.
The telescope, which is funded by US authorities, is expected to provide new insights into the universe after its installation in 2025 and will take detailed images of the southern hemisphere sky on a regular basis over a period of ten years. The builders hope that this will usher in a “new era of astronomy and astrophysics” and “crystal-clear views of space, revealing millions of previously unknown objects in the solar system in more detail than ever before.”
The observatory is named after the American astronomer Vera Rubin, who provided the first convincing evidence for the existence of dark matter.