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Volume 40
Number 9
January 10, 2008 |
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Telescope project gets $30 million
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Pitt and 22 partner institutions made a major advance this month in a project to develop the world’s most powerful survey telescope.
The large synoptic survey telescope (LSST) project received $10 million from Microsoft founder Bill Gates and $20 million from the Charles Simonyi Fund for Arts and Sciences, established by Microsoft executive Charles Simonyi.
The public-private LSST project has been under development since 2000 and is directed by the University of California-Davis. Expected to be completed in 2014, the powerful telescope will capture and record the movement and development of deep space in a multi-color, movie-like format. At 3 billion pixels, the LSST will be the largest digital camera ever built and will generate 30 trillion bytes of data per night from its perch on Cerro Pachon, a mountain in northern Chile.
The detailed footage will provide a unique opportunity to study the dark matter that constitutes much of the visible sky and the mysterious dark energy causing the universe’s expansion. All information will be made available as it is observed on one of the largest public databases ever created.
Pitt joined the project in last July. Faculty members from Pitt’s Department of Physics and Astronomy involved in the project are Jeffrey Newman, who is helping to develop new measurement techniques for determining how far back in the universe’s history the telescope is looking, and Arthur Kosowsky and Andrew Zentner, who will help conduct the theoretical work behind interpreting the collected data.
From Pitt’s Department of Computer Science, Panos K. Chrysanthis and Alexandros Labrinidis, co-directors of the University’s Advanced Data Management Technologies Laboratory, will work on managing the immense amount of data LSST will collect.
Carnegie Mellon University joined the project Jan. 2, and will work with Pitt and the Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center to help manage LSST data.
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