The Earth may seem like an invisible grain of sand compared to the total number of objects in outer space, which is literally teeming with stars, galaxies and asteroids.
Using visible infrared light and the Pan-STARRS Observatory's panoramic view system, astronomers have created the most detailed digital map of this entire mass of comic bodies to date. It is currently the largest digital survey in the world.
Pan-STARRS is a 1.8-meter telescope located at the summit of Mount Haleakala, on the island of Maui. It is a consortium of astronomers and engineers from 14 institutes in six countries, including the University of Hawaii, the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy (MPIA) in Heidelberg and the Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics in Garching.
The new map of the Universe (Pan-STARRS1 survey) covers about 3 billion sources of visible and infrared light, including galaxies, stars and other objects. The total amount of data is about 2 petabytes. The collection of information using Pan-STARRS has been carried out for four years, and now, only now all this data has become available to the astrophysical community and scientific research.
“The Pan-STARRS1 survey will allow anyone to access millions of images and use databases and catalogs containing accurate data on billions of stars and galaxies,” explained Ken Chambers, director of Pan-STARRS Observatories. “From this publication, we expect an impressive number of new discoveries within the universe that scientists and students around the world can make.”
