History Article
Close
This entry was posted on December 19, 2013 at 12:48.
The last change is December 19, 2013 at 12:49.
‘game on time from French Guiana, and after 40 minutes the applause scrosciato. Gaia, the satellite throughout Europe by EUR 1 billion that will tell us how it’s made our Galaxy with a precision unimaginable until now, is in fact took off at 10.12 Italian time and entered into a safe orbit that will take him to his place of work, 1.5 million kilometers from Earth. A particular point, found on the map by a great physicist, Lagrange, this year in Turin will celebrate the 250th anniversary of his birth. There, the forces of attraction of the Sun and Moon and Earth are equal and the satellite will happily spend the next 5 years to measure a billion stars, galaxies 1000000 and hopefully find at least 10,000 new extrasolar planets, firm judged impossible when he left the ‘idea of ??Gaia in 1991.
The extreme complexity of the satellite, two telescopes with six mirrors, a mosaic CCD detector 106 for a total of 1 billion pixels, the largest ever went into space, which will produce a catalog of a petabye, comparable to the major database existing as complexity, also because it has to be created in a synchronous manner, ie taking into account all the data at the same time, several billion.
Gaia once it reaches the position in L2 act as a beacon to all the time, in our case for 5 years, and wheel illuminates a part of the galaxy, stealing simultaneously position and brightness of the stars it encounters. The accuracy of these measurements is difficult to give numbers, to see scientists say that Gaia is capable of measuring the thickness of a human hair to 1000 kilometers and beyond.
In 2019 the satellite will finish his work and 4 years later, in 2023 will be ready the catalog of Gaia that will bring back the position and brightness of a billion stars. As surveyors cosmic scientists begin to reconstruct the true shape of our galaxy, which will tell us a lot about where we are, what they look like our neighbors, as the stars evolve, which is the physics that governs the stars, these gigantic forges with a ‘inexhaustible source of energy, nuclear fusion that we pursue here on earth for 50 years.
Gaia is one of the main projects of the European Space Agency, the so-called cornerstone for their scientific importance, technological and industrial, born of a huge industrial effort led by the French consortium of Astrium, with 70 companies from 16 countries. Italy participates very actively, is the second country after France and one of the projects in which they work more young researchers, to live with an enthusiasm that followed the launch in Padua and Turin University at Altec, was palpable and culminated in a liberating appaluso after the fateful 40 minutes that a satellite can still fail the entry into orbit. It ‘alright, let’s work on the cosmic surveyor, in 2023 we will know better what is our place in the Universe.
© ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
Permalink
No comments:
Post a Comment