Free Astronomy Magazine September-October 2025

SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2025 I n this immense image, Rubin Observatory offers a brand new view of two old friends: the Trifid and Lagoon Nebulae. The image provides a demonstration of what makes Rubin unique: its combination of an extremely wide field of view and the speed that allows it to take lots of big images in a very short time. Combining images reveals subtle details in the clouds of gas and dust. The more images we can combine, the more detail we see! This almost 5-gigapixel image combines 678 exposures taken in just 7.2 hours of observing time, and was composed from about two trillion pixels of data in total. No other observatory is capable of pro- ducing an image of such a wide area so quickly and with this much depth. [RubinObs/NOIRLab/SLAC/NSF/DOE/AURA] ! will contain billions of objects with trillions of measurements. With regular data releases, scien- tists will be able to conduct their own investigations into Rubin’s data remotely, enabling and expe- diting countless discoveries about our Universe and advancing science in ways we can’t yet predict. Rubin also brings the power of as- tronomical data and interactive learning to educators and students around the world through an on- line public engagement platform developed by a team of astron- omers, educators, and web design experts, which provides tools and activities to engage and interact with a subset of Rubin Observatory data. Rubin Observatory’s First Look im- ages were also shared with over 350 public and private Watch Par- ties hosted by partner institutions, planetariums, observatories, muse- ums, libraries, amateur astronomy societies, schools, and universities around the world. Legacy Survey of Space and Time, which has the potential to reshape our understanding of the Uni- verse.” The LSST Camera at the heart of Rubin Observatory captures ex- tremely fine features in distant galaxies, stars, and other celestial objects. A team of scientists, engi- neers, and technicians at SLAC Na- tional Accelerator Laboratory de- signed and constructed the camera, which is roughly the size of a small car and weighs almost 6200 pounds (2800 kilograms). Each image taken by the LSST Cam- era covers an area on the sky as big as 45 full Moons. During its ten-year survey, Rubin will generate approximately 20 ter- abytes of data per night, plus an additional 15 petabyte catalog database. In 10 years, Rubin data processing will generate around 500 petabytes, and the final dataset