Sky-scanning complete for Gaia
16 comments
·January 15, 2025lysace
Gaia has a 1.0 × 0.5 m focal plane array on which light from both telescopes is projected. This in turn consists of 106 CCDs of 4500 × 1966 pixels each, for a total of 937.8 megapixels.
Neat.
NKosmatos
Direct link to some very very nice images and animations: https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/Gaia
Two of my favorites: https://www.esa.int/ESA_Multimedia/Images/2025/The_best_Milk...
https://www.esa.int/ESA_Multimedia/Images/2025/01/The_best_M...
dylan604
I get how Gaia could make the best edge on image, but how could Gaia (or anything man made) get the the "best" face on image?
boxed
I wonder if it could keep giving us useful data without the precision rotation? Intuitively it seems like we should be able to figure out where it's pointing by star-matching plus dead reckoning based on the last frame.
ndileas
It's possible...but the point of this instrument is to measure star locations very precisely. It probably has a star tracker for positioning doing what you're suggesting. If you were to use that type of positioning info you could introduce inaccuracies into the measured data eventually.
Also, every mission comes to an end eventually - better to do it in the right way and have the right amount of propellent saved for either a graveyard orbit or de-orbiting. It met the mission timeline and goals.
boxed
Yea ok. Still, it seems like it could produce a lot of very useful data if switched to a blind spinning mode.
mrbluecoat
Farewell, friend. Hello, LSST.
PittleyDunkin
I really wish they would have identified Gaia as some kind of satellite. Gaia is also a name for Earth itself.
qwertox
You may want to know: the high-res images which are offered for downloading contain the same image which is shown on the page, that is, the infographic.
Not worth the download, as I thought that it would contain a huge panorama of the sky.
IndrekR
For real data you can use Gaia ESA archive: https://gea.esac.esa.int/archive/
I went to study MSc in Space Science and Technology as a hobby few years ago. In one course (2022) we had an assignment to find Supernovae from recent Gaia data (Python code). Then made sure this is observable by University’s robotic telescope (and compliant with local weather forecast). Next requested the observation from the telescope and if successful, received the pictures next day. Had to analyse the results as well. It surprised me how much data there actually is available in quite open format from ESA missions.
Controlling remote telescope few thousand kilometres away was also a nice experience.
robin_reala
The downlinked data is claimed to be 142TB compressed. I suspect that the huge panorama might be a little big for your computer.
tokai
And now to use the data to make the most realistic scifi game. With correct stellar motion during relativistic travel.
flohofwoe
Elite Dangerous already has more known star systems (160k) in the Milky Way than you can realistically visit - and the rest (400 billion) filled in with plausibly simulated systems: https://elite-dangerous.fandom.com/wiki/Galaxy#Milky_Way - it even kind-of predicted a star system that was only discovered after the game was released: https://elite-dangerous.fandom.com/wiki/Trappist-1#Impact_of...
buildbot
I didn’t realize a game actually used an approach like this, really cool. Reminds me of the simulated MMORG world in Neal Stephenson’s README, where they tried to simulate the formation of the planet to get realistic mineral deposits and topology.
ndileas1
Now that most stars are mapped, next step: map all the planets.
IIRC Gaia had a performance degradation because of stray light, probably ice on the border of it's aperture[1].
How has that affected this result?
[1] https://blogs.esa.int/gaia/2014/06/16/preliminary-analysis-o...