Billion-pixel camera to find 10 new planets per day!

Ok now this is quite exciting...for some

The ESA will be launching Gaia mounted with the worlds most powerful camera.

In 2013, the European Space Agency will launch the Gaia spacecraft. Its billion-pixel imaging sensor will be among the largest digital cameras ever to exist, and over the course of its mission, it's estimated that Gaia will detect 15,000 new alien planets.

Gaia's gigantic sensor is comprised of 106 separate CCD detectors, mosaiced together to form a monster camera over three feet wide. The resulting imaging system is so powerful that it will be able to precisely measure the width of a hair from over 600 miles away, and from here on Earth, it could spot a dime on the moon.

Hmmm.....it could spot a dime on the mood eh? too bad they don't aim it at the apollo landing sites to prove once and for all that we went to the moon.....OR have it orbit and do a full image scan of Mars.

Source

Either way the tech exists so why doesn't NASA follow suit and use this to image the moon and Mars? instead we get grainy, crappy photo's and the "There's nothing to see here but rocks and tricks of light and shadow's"

reply to post by QBSneak000


15,000 alien planets, as in planets that are likely to have life, or complex life or as in 15,000 planets that just discovered?

Jamie.

thats fantastic !!! I can't wait to see these pictures


a dime on the moon it says , intresting . Perhaps it can put an end to the theories once and for all . If only...




could you ask them if they could help fund the james webb telescope for us ?

www.abovetopsecret.com...

kinda broke... lol

Probably just planets on their own. I doubt if they found life they would tell us anyways.

Originally posted by QBSneak000
Probably just planets on their own. I doubt if they found life they would tell us anyways.

Okey doke thanks! - Still it's amazing technology anyway!

Jamie.

reply to post by seedofchucky



Im sure the pictures would be scanned, scrubbed and brushed of anything remotely suggesting life before handed out for public viewing....much like how NASA works.

You know, just had a thought, its expected to draw a big map of our galaxy, now imagine what it would be like to show that map to people and have us pointed out on it, and say that's where we are, we're tiny aren't we? But we can be bigger. To me that spells out maturity, would be truly an amazing moment.

Jamie.

Originally posted by QBSneak000
too bad they don't aim it at the apollo landing sites to prove once and for all that we went to the moon

eh, those folks would just say those images were as much a hoax as the original Moon mission.

Good thread, I wasn't familar with this mission. Thanks for sharing. S&F.

Its too bad amateur astronomers and the community of ATS couldn't afford to cobble together something like it Earth based) to see for ourselves what is on the moon in closeup HD. NASA and TBTB would have a hard time denouncing what may be found.

I am pretty jazzed to see what these photos of new planets will look like. Most likely just dots of light but.....

I wonder if they are planning to take better photos of the planets in our solar system and their moons as well?

reply to post by QBSneak000


Why would they need to pander to people who still want to think we never went to the moon? Even if they did decide to humor them, if those people still don't believe it now, they won't believe it then either. Rather pathetic really. Plus there are already pictures if people want to actually go look for them...google is a marvelous thing.

Apollo Landing Site LRO Photos

Something such as this is much better served being used to look at deep space as they seem to intend to do. We have plenty of missions lined up to look at our planets plus Mars and the Moon already have orbiters taking pictures. Sending it off to orbit Mars just to take more pictures of what we already have would also be a massive risk compared to having it look out from Earth's orbit even if you don't consider the loss ratio for missions sent to the red planet over the decades.

In regards to why NASA doesn't follow suit...because they can't even get funding for the James Webb Telescope (the Hubble replacement which is almost certainly going to be cancelled due to more cuts to their budget that is already several hundred million below what their limit had been cut down to before). The government would rather cut out science's already abysmal funding than the 20 billion a year they've been wasting on air conditioning tents in the middle east. They think it's all about encouraging the private sector to pick up the slack like they have been with space travel, but instead it's just going to lead to further outsourcing our technological and scientific endeavors to other countries. LHC was originally planned to be in the US for instance.

I'm sure they'll be waiting in line to book time on Gaia for various research that Hubble can't do right a long with the rest of the scientific world so it's still a very good tool to get out there.

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Why not use a more powerful camera? There has already been a 111gigapixel picture taken.

reply to post by QBSneak000


How contradictory you are about what you say. So you are 'jazzed up' to see photos you believe are not genuine. What a psychological journey.

Originally posted by Wulfric
Why not use a more powerful camera? There has already been a 111gigapixel picture taken.

Probably budgetary constraints. There is the matter of getting the camera into space, meaning size and weight restrictions. This one is already 3 feet wide.

Originally posted by QBSneak000
Hmmm.....it could spot a dime on the mood eh? too bad they don't aim it at the apollo landing sites to prove once and for all that we went to the moon.....OR have it orbit and do a full image scan of Mars.

The LRO photos have already proven that, unless you think they were doctored, and if that's the case, what's the point in aiming anything else at the moon, which will face the same claim? Waste of time.

Originally posted by pandapowerjamie
15,000 alien planets, as in planets that are likely to have life, or complex life or as in 15,000 planets that just discovered?

Detecting earth-sized planets is always hard. Most of the planets discovered so far don't appear to be conducive to life as we know it, with some exceptions.

I suspect that the majority of planets discovered will continue to be unlikely to be able to support life as we know it, but the number of exceptions which might support it will increase with better, more sensitive technology like this.

reply to post by Arbitrageur


"Hmmm.....it could spot a dime on the mood eh? too bad they don't aim it at the apollo landing sites to prove once and for all that we went to the moon.....OR have it orbit and do a full image scan of Mars.




The LRO photos have already proven that, unless you think they were doctored, and if that's the case, what's the point in aiming anything else at the moon, which will face the same claim? Waste of time"


Clearly he was talking about spotting a dime kinda detail ... the LRO photos do not show that close .....Did you miss the memo champ?

Why jump to doctored ? when he was simply asking for dime clairty type detail ... not LRO detail which is clearly much further away ....

Originally posted by Illustronic
reply to post by QBSneak000

 

How contradictory you are about what you say. So you are 'jazzed up' to see photos you believe are not genuine. What a psychological journey.

No..not really. Just because I believe that they would doctor any photos showing any possible evidence of life past or present, Im still pretty excited to see photos of something beyond our own planet. Whether its the surface of the moon, mars or just photos of space in general.

reply to post by Dashdragon


Yes, the LRO photo's showed the landing sites....but it was nothing more than a white blip. Im talking about the resolution of seeing a dime on the moon in detail from the earth kind of photos......

Keep in mind, I DO believe they went to the moon, but many people, regardless of the LRO photos still cry foul. I know even if they did take the super detail photo's people would still believe its a hoax....you can't please everyone.

update 2013reply to post by QBSneak000


update 2013 website

Pretty amazing technology! This will produce some extremely exciting imaging.

As for anyone who wants to cry coverup or doctoring of images really doesn't understand what they are looking at half of the time, or the kind of image processing that occurs.

I remember reading a bunch of stuff about green patches on Mars, and people saying "OH proof there is plants on Mars!" These cameras don't operate in colour, they take monochrome images through filters and typically you only take 3 shots and compose them like that. Press release images often get passed through a 'quick' processing cycle that is automated and no one actually looks at each image.

Its absolutely hilarious for me to sit and read what people 'think' happens with these instruments.

You know Hubble? Do you think a government agency looks at each image before sending it out to scientists? No let me explain how these things work.

1) Scientist writes a research proposal asking for time on the telescope. It is a bidding process and they are expected to give reasons why they are interested in an object and how long they need and during what time of year.
2) If it gets accepted, when the time of year comes, the telescope is re-pointed (an operation that can take days) and takes exposures as defined by the astronomer in order to collect enough photons or expose what ever instrument on hubble they want to use of what ever object they are interested in.
3) The data gets dumped, in a RAW format, probably FITS format (not sure but iv looked at raw astro data before and it really is not in jpeg (LOL) it was in FITS ) to a RAID array somewhere and the scientist is given access to download and do what ever he or she likes with it.

Thats about it... there really isn't people looking at each image with a fine toothed comb and covering up everything... you realize that the Hubble could break and we would still be getting press release images out of it for about 10 years right? There is a VAST amount of data that has not seen light of day.

I also agree with NOT imaging of the moon... why? what would it achieve? Most who don't think we got there will never be convinced, and even the OP's attitude of, 'while it is interesting, i think it will be covered up' is really not any better.

Also I can chime in with the same as has already been said... countries around the world spend money on things that are totally pointless... science is one that they dont spend any money on in comparison, and yet the media and people like to make out that money is being waisted on science when so many better causes can get the money... Sorry but total garbage. Science funding is bad enough as it is... Scientists dont drive around in sports cars and take 1st class plane tickets to conferences...

Originally posted by QBSneak000

Hmmm.....it could spot a dime on the mood eh? too bad they don't aim it at the apollo landing sites to prove once and for all that we went to the moon.....OR have it orbit and do a full image scan of Mars.

Source

Either way the tech exists so why doesn't NASA follow suit and use this to image the moon and Mars? instead we get grainy, crappy photo's and the "There's nothing to see here but rocks and tricks of light and shadow's"

because its pointless to spend billions of dollars to prove some crazy people on the internet wrong.