The Southern Pinwheel Galaxy (also known as Messier 83 or NGC 5236) is about 15 million lightyears from Earth. It took DECam more than 11 hours of exposure time to capture this image. The camera is mounted on the Víctor M. Blanco 4-meter Telescope at Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory, a program of NSF's NOIRLab. Credit: CTIO/NOIRLab/DOE/NSF/AURA; Acknowledgment: M. Soraisam (University of Illinois); Image processing: Travis Rector (University of Alaska Anchorage), Mahdi Zamani and Davide de Martin
The dark energy camera has taken more than one million pictures of the southern sky. Around 2.5 billion objects have been captured in the images.
The Dark Energy Camera was built at the U.S. Department of Energy. Dark energy is a phenomenon that is speeding up the expansion of space.
The Dark Energy Survey isn't the only experiment that will benefit from the equipment. The camera has also been used to conduct surveys. The Dark Energy Camera is used to create many great photos.
One-eighth of the sky was captured by the Dark Energy Survey. The survey imaged a lot of deep fields. Scientists are able to image incredibly distant galaxies and faint objects by returning to certain areas of the sky. The deep fields can be used to find supernovae.
The Dark Energy Survey imaged one-eighth of the sky, capturing light from galaxies up to 8 billion lightyears away. The survey repeatedly imaged 10 "deep fields" like the one shown here. By returning to certain sections of the sky, scientists are able to build up and collect different wavelengths of light to image incredibly distant galaxies and faint objects. These deep fields can be used to calibrate the rest of the DES data and to hunt for supernovae. Credit: Dark Energy Survey/DOE/FNAL/DECam/CTIO/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA; Acknowledgments: T.A. Rector (University of Alaska Anchorage/NSF's NOIRLab), M. Zamani (NSF's NOIRLab) and D. de Martin (NSF's NOIRLab)
Sometimes closer objects come into view as the Dark Energy Survey looks at objects millions or billions of light years away. The Dark Energy Survey spotted a comet about 51 million miles away. Each of the 62 CCDs that DECam uses is represented in the image by a rectangular shape.
The Spanish Dancer is a spiral galaxy that is 69 million light years away. The decisions that were made during image processing resulted in each photo. The camera uses five filters that record a different wavelength of light and can be combined to make a picture.
While the Dark Energy Survey typically looks at objects millions or billions of lightyears away, sometimes closer objects come into view. In 2014, the Dark Energy Survey spotted Comet Lovejoy traveling about 51 million miles from Earth. Each rectangle in the image represents one of the 62 CCDs that DECam uses, each one a sophisticated sensor designed to capture light from distant galaxies. Credit: Marty Murphy, Nikolay Kuropatkin, Huan Lin and Brian Yanny; Dark Energy Survey
This photo was taken looking at the center of our galaxy and contains more than 180,000 stars. A bigger version of the Milky Way's bulge can be seen. While beautiful, the stars and dust of the Milky Way block out distant galaxies needed to study dark energy.
We can see the spiral galaxy from our position on the planet. 66.5 million lightyears away is the location of the Little SombreroGalaxy. To keep images of distant objects as sharp as possible, DECam uses a mechanism called a Hexapods, which uses pneumatically driven pistons to align the camera's many optical elements between exposures. The largest of the five light filters is more than 3 feet wide and weighs more than 400 pounds.
The Large and Small Magellanic Clouds are a great place to look at star formation. The dark energy camera was used for the survey.
The spiral galaxy NGC 1566, sometimes called the Spanish Dancer, is about 69 million lightyears from Earth. Each photo from DECam is the result of choices made during image processing. The camera uses five filters that each record a different wavelength of light (between 400 and 1,080 nanometers) and can be combined to make color images. Credit: Dark Energy Survey
There is a large spiral galaxy at the center of this picture. Some of the most precise maps of the universe's structure have been created by the Dark Energy Survey.
The cluster of stars is 28,700 light years away. The stars are focused on the center of the sphere. The Dark Energy Survey looks at distant galaxies and galaxy clusters to better understand dark energy.
The data from the Dark Energy Survey has led to the discovery of several new dwarf galaxies. IC 1613 is about 2 million lightyears away and contains 100 million stars. Our Milky Way galaxy is estimated to hold between 100 and 400 billion stars, dwarf galaxies are considered small and faint.
A wide-angle view of the Small Magellanic Cloud. The Large and Small Magellanic Clouds are dwarf satellite galaxies to the Milky Way, and their proximity makes them a valuable place to study star formation. The Dark Energy Camera captured deep looks at our galactic neighbors for the Survey of the Magellanic Stellar History, or SMASH. Credit: CTIO/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/SMASH/D. Nidever (Montana State University); Acknowledgment: Image processing: Travis Rector (University of Alaska Anchorage), Mahdi Zamani and Davide de Martin
This DECam photo, taken looking toward the center of our Milky Way galaxy, covers an area roughly twice as wide as the full moon and contains more than 180,000 stars. You can also see a wider version encompassing more of the Milky Way's bulge. While beautiful, the stars and dust of the Milky Way block out distant galaxies needed to study dark energy—so the Dark Energy Survey typically aims the telescope in the opposite direction, away from the plane of our galaxy. Credit: CTIO/NOIRLab/DOE/NSF/AURA/STScI, W. Clarkson (UM-Dearborn), C. Johnson (STScI), and M. Rich (UCLA)
From our position on Earth, we see the spiral galaxy NGC 681 from the side (or edge-on). The galaxy, also known as the Little Sombrero Galaxy, is about 66.5 million lightyears away. To keep images of distant objects as sharp as possible, DECam uses a mechanism called a Hexapod, which uses six pneumatically driven pistons to align the camera's many optical elements between exposures. In addition to the five light filters, DECam also has five optical lenses, the biggest of which is more than 3 feet wide and weighs 388 pounds. Credit: Erin Sheldon, Dark Energy Survey
A wide-angle view of the Small Magellanic Cloud. The Large and Small Magellanic Clouds are dwarf satellite galaxies to the Milky Way, and their proximity makes them a valuable place to study star formation. The Dark Energy Camera captured deep looks at our galactic neighbors for the Survey of the Magellanic Stellar History, or SMASH. Credit: CTIO/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/SMASH/D. Nidever (Montana State University); Acknowledgment: Image processing: Travis Rector (University of Alaska Anchorage), Mahdi Zamani and Davide de Martin
This DECam photo, taken looking toward the center of our Milky Way galaxy, covers an area roughly twice as wide as the full moon and contains more than 180,000 stars. You can also see a wider version encompassing more of the Milky Way's bulge. While beautiful, the stars and dust of the Milky Way block out distant galaxies needed to study dark energy—so the Dark Energy Survey typically aims the telescope in the opposite direction, away from the plane of our galaxy. Credit: CTIO/NOIRLab/DOE/NSF/AURA/STScI, W. Clarkson (UM-Dearborn), C. Johnson (STScI), and M. Rich (UCLA)
About 650 lightyears away from Earth, the Helix Nebula is a planetary cloud. The Dark Energy Camera's CCDs are shown in the picture. The remains of stars are what's known as planetary nebulae. A dying star has ejected its outer layers and left a small white dwarf surrounded by gas. Our own sun will experience the same fate.
11 million lightyears away is the SculptorGalaxy. It is one of 500 million galaxies that have been imaged by the Dark Energy Survey. Automated software was used to point the camera and take pictures. What part of the sky was overhead, weather conditions, and which areas had recently been imaged were some of the factors that the software could factor in.
There are hundreds of millions of stars around the elliptical galaxies. There are thousands of other distant galaxies visible in this zoomable version. Each image is about a gigabyte in size, and contains a lot of information. In a single night, the Dark Energy Survey could produce up to 2.5 terabytes of data.
