Boffins take the world's first 3,200-megapixel digital snaps
 

Roman broccoli selfie

Boffins at the Menlo Park SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory have taken the world's first 3,200-megapixel digital photos, using an advanced imaging device that's built to explore the universe.

Steven Kahn, director of the Vera C. Rubin Observatory in Chile said that the snaps will measure and catalogue 20 billion galaxies.

The world's largest digital camera will become the centrepiece of a monumental effort to map the night sky. The camera will spend 10 years capturing the most detailed images of the universe ever taken.

The team working on the camera just completed the focal plane, which is an array of imaging sensors more than two feet wide.

It took the team about six months to assemble the sensors, largely because the sensors can easily crack if they touch each other during the installation process.

Since the camera isn't complete, scientists used a pinhole projector to test the focal plane. They snapped photos of an image of Vera C. Rubin - the late scientist the observatory is named for, the camera team, and a head of romanesco broccoli because they need their fibre.

https://fudzilla.com/news/51763-boff...-digital-snaps