A telescope attached to a giant balloon can take the same pictures as the Hubble and Webb telescopes.
A week ago, scientists sent a new telescope into Earth’s atmosphere to explore the cosmos, and in particular the mysterious dark matter. The new SuperBIT observatory is attached to a huge balloon the size of a football stadium and is located at an altitude of about 33 km from the planet’s surface. The Daily Mail writes that a few days after launch, the new telescope is sending back stunning images of the Tarantula Nebula and Antenna galaxies that rival the image quality of space telescopes like Hubble and Webb.
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Scientists from Durham University in the UK, the University of Toronto in Canada and Princeton University in the USA have joined forces to create a brand new observatory for deep space exploration. The peculiarity of this telescope is that it is attached to a huge helium-filled balloon, has a wider field of view than the Hubble telescope, and costs 1000 times less to manufacture and launch. NASA also agrees with the authors of the new development because the cost of helium is much lower than rocket fuel, and there is no need for launch vehicles to launch such an observatory.
The SuperBIT telescope was launched into space from Wanaka Airport in New Zealand on April 16, 2023. According to the scientists, the main goal of his 100-day scientific mission is to study the properties of the mysterious dark matter and map its distribution. The observatory will try to map it out by studying how dark matter, particularly in galaxy clusters, warps the space around them.
To conduct space exploration, the observatory was sent to an altitude of about 33 km, where astronomical observations can already be made. The new observatory can take images of space in the visible and near ultraviolet light ranges.
A few days after launch, the SuperBIT telescope sent the first images of deep space that matched the quality of images from space telescopes like Hubble and Webb. We are talking about stunning images of space objects such as the Tarantula Nebula and the Antennae galaxy.
The Antenna Galaxies are a pair of large spiral galaxies called NGC 4038 and NGC 4039 that are in the process of merging into a large galaxy. This pair is located 60 million light-years from us in the constellation of the Raven, but their convergence began several hundred million years ago. Therefore, Antenna galaxies are among the youngest merging objects of this type known to astronomers.
The Tarantula Nebula consists of gaseous hydrogen and is rapidly forming a new star. This nebula is located 161,000 light-years from us in the Milky Way’s satellite galaxy called the Large Magellanic Cloud. By the way, this nebula has already been photographed by the Hubble Space Telescope and Webb Telescope.
Focus He has already written in detail about the Tarantula Nebula and has also written that the birthplace of the largest stars in the Universe has been discovered.
Moreover Focus He wrote about the merging of two spiral galaxies that turned into an ultra-bright infrared galaxy. This object was recently photographed by the Webb Space Telescope.
On the other hand, a recent study suggests that dark matter, which is believed to fill a large part of our universe, can take on a special shape. Scientists have also proposed a new way to detect dark matter, which no one has seen before, as previously mentioned. Focus.
Source: Focus
Ashley Fitzgerald is an accomplished journalist in the field of technology. She currently works as a writer at 24 news breaker. With a deep understanding of the latest technology developments, Ashley’s writing provides readers with insightful analysis and unique perspectives on the industry.