Rubin Observatory Under the Milky Way

View of Vera C. Rubin Observatory beneath the glittering band of the Milky Way. Rubin Observatory, located in Chile, will use an 8.4-meter telescope equipped with the largest digital camera in the world to conduct a 10-year survey of the entire southern hemisphere sky beginning in late 2025. The resulting data, with images taken through six different color filters, will make it easier than ever for scientists to isolate stellar streams among and beyond the Milky Way and examine them for signs of dark matter disruption.

Alt text: Rubin Observatory under a starry night sky. The observatory sits on top of its rocky summit site in the foreground, and is made of a long white building that extends to the left and a silver angular dome sticking up. The Milky Way is visible, spanning the image horizontally above the observatory as a dense stream of stars interspersed with dark and wispy dust clouds. The yellow glow of city lights in La Serena are seen in the distance to the lower left.