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New Infrared Camera Gets Amazing Orion Images

Posted by timothy on from the spaceporn dept.

The BBC is reporting, as is the Register, about the new Wide-Field Camera (WFCAM) on the UK Infrared Telescope (UKIRT) in Hawaii. WFCAM is the world's most powerful astronomical infrared camera. It's 5.4 meters long and weighs 1500 kilograms. As part of its commissioning, it produced some stunning images of interstellar clouds in Orion.

52 comments

  1. irony? by deathazre · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    nothing for you to see here. please move along.

    --
    Karma: Negative (Mostly affected by dorm trolling)
  2. Re:conspiracy by glassjaw+rocks · · Score: 2

    You, sir, have way too much time on your hands. Enjoy the holiday, instead of trolling. It'll make you feel warm and fuzzy inside.

    --
    -gjr
  3. amazing by blackomegax · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I love the composite shot, showing the zoom steppings, putting it all into perspective... The max zoom quality is jaw dropping.

  4. color codes by global_diffusion · · Score: 4, Informative

    Hey, check out these pics. The nice thing is that they labeled them with what the colors actually mean (instead of having people think that interstellar gas is normally green and purple, like in star trek).

  5. Of all the photos , the one I liked by Gopal.V · · Score: 4, Interesting

    It's an infra red telescope and all that... it can see a lot of stuff in space BUT the photo I really loved was this Down to Earth Night shot of the telescope itself....

    --
    Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur
    1. Re:Of all the photos , the one I liked by Fweeky · · Score: 2, Insightful

      That's a great shot, let down purely by *insane* amounts of noise :(

    2. Re:Of all the photos , the one I liked by budgenator · · Score: 1

      Why do you assume it's noise? A long expossure of the sky at night picks up a lot of stars to dimm to be visable to the naked eye, this exposure was about 2 or 3 hours judging from the star trails. the star trails are caused by the Earth's rotation.

      --
      Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
  6. Sherpa scientists? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    The altitude of this thing is 13760 feet above sea level. Normal folk need extra oxygen at that altitude. Are the living quarters pressurised? Is it operated by remote control?

    1. Re:Sherpa scientists? by Evil_Timmy · · Score: 2, Informative

      Ehh, no, normal folk don't. Many, many people each year climb Mount Rainier (in Washington state), which is 14,410 feet high, and my uncle's said none of his clients have ever needed supplemental air. He's a professional mountain guide with over 300 climbs of Rainier alone. Everest Base Camp, where climbers go to acclimatize, is at about 17,060 feet, and needing oxygen there is exceptionally rare; if you need it there, there's no way you're going to make it higher up on the mountain. So, at 13,760 feet, the air may be thin but there's no need for pressurized quarters or anything like that.

    2. Re:Sherpa scientists? by Shag · · Score: 5, Insightful
      13760? Bah, that's comfy. Slightly uphill from UKIRT is the University of Hawaii's 88-inch scope, which is sited at roughly 13770 feet with its dome floor around 13790+. There are others on Mauna Kea with higher dome floors (bigger facilities, more modern) but 88 is the highest-sited scope in the world that's regularly manned every week of the year (and often every day), by day crew for maintenance and/or night operators.

      Yes, I work there. No, I don't use oxygen. Below about 15000 feet the TUC (Time of Useful Consciousness) is "indefinite" which means some people can go hang out for 12-14 hours with nothing bad happening. There are some observatories up there that are talking about creating a single pressurized "break room" for staff - not where I work, though. :)

      Oh, and the Rockwell HAWAII-2RG 2048x2048 sensors used to build UKIRT's WFCAM (it has 4 of them in a square array) were co-developed by U. of Hawaii, Rockwell Scientific and UMC, and first deployed in November of 2003 in the "ULB" camera on 88. For some time, 88 with ULB was the most powerful infrared setup for astrophotography; since UKIRT is the largest dedicated infrared scope in the world, it will now (with its own 16-megapixel camera) really take some great pictures. :) I was over at UKIRT for their 25th anniversary open house, and it's one BIG instrument.

      ...of course, Gemini South (8.1-meter) has ordered some HAWAII-2RG chips from Rockwell, I think... and the European folks are mumbling about doing a 4x4 array of them (64 megapixels) for their forthcoming VISTA telescope in Chile, which will be the bigger better successor to UKIRT.

      --
      Village idiot in some extremely smart villages.
    3. Re:Sherpa scientists? by dpp · · Score: 2, Informative

      You're quite right that we don't use supplemental oxygen when up at the telescopes.

      However, one difference that I would point out is that usually people climbing mountains such as Mount Rainier (I presume) and certainly Everest will take quite some time to trek up to these kinds of altitudes. With Mauna Kea, you can in principle get from the sea-level town of Hilo to the nearly 14,000-foot summit in a couple of hours if you don't stop to acclimatize. This is, however, an extremely bad idea! People spend acclimatization time at the 9,000-ft level.

      The fact that one gets to these kinds of altitudes in a comparatively short time makes the situation slightly different from that of climbers, as far as I understand it.

      Your point still stands, though... the telescope control rooms do not have enriched levels of oxygen.

      --
      This post is strictly my own opinion and not necessarily that of my employer.
    4. Re:Sherpa scientists? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's hilarious how so many people (most of whom seem to live in San Francisco) think 14,000 feet is practically outer space. Here in Colorado people hang out on mountains over 14,000 feet all the time. Pike's Peak overflows with out-of-shape tourists (and concessions workers) who drove up and do just fine without additional oxygen.

      Hell, people even climb Everest, K2, and many other high mountains without additional oxygen. The "danger zone" - the elevation above which the human body continually degrades and can't recouperate - is about 26,000 feet.

      Here's a hilarious entry and comments in the infamous jwz's blog showcasing peoples' complete ignorance:
      http://jwz.livejournal.com/381017.html

    5. Re:Sherpa scientists? by phirst · · Score: 2, Informative

      Actually, a couple of corrections: WFCAM uses HAWAII-II arrays, not HAWAII-IIRGs, and VISTA is using arrays from Rayethon, they're not Rockwell Hawaii arrays at all.

    6. Re:Sherpa scientists? by Shag · · Score: 1

      Oops, you're quite right about VISTA -- I should've remembered that, just read it yesterday.

      I didn't know about the distinction between HAWAII-II and HAWAII-IIRG - what's the difference?

      Thanks!

      --
      Village idiot in some extremely smart villages.
  7. Orion image by MerlTurkin · · Score: 2, Informative

    Man that's a GREAT image! Congrats to the imaging team!

    1. Re:Orion image by phirst · · Score: 1

      Thanks! :)

  8. Deep Space Scanner by sam_handelman · · Score: 1

    The little speck in the lower-left hand corner?

    We assume that it is a giant killer crab robot that the ancient orionids left in orbit to defend their treasure trove of super science.

    Of course, without the Improved Space Scanner we can't be sure.

    --
    The good and new comes from no quarter where it is looked for, and is always something different from what is expected.
  9. Re:conspiracy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    I wonder how many light-years that dude's wang measures?

  10. Beautiful, just beautiful. by shrike99 · · Score: 0

    Shaddap all you nay-sayers and just LOOK at the images. They are a wonderful Christsmas gift, and make a damn good windoz wallpaper. *inux geeks too can rejoice as well. Merry Christmas!

    --
    "Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day, but set fire to him and he's warm for the rest of his life." Terry Pratchet
  11. Dusty Galaxy? by erichill · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Check out the object on the right edge toward the bottom of the xlarge picture. It looks remarkably like a spiral galaxy seen edge on. If I understand this image correctly that galaxy wouldn't be visible in the visible through that cloud. If so, it must be terrifically bright in the IR.

    --
    Credo sim. - I think I am.
    1. Re:Dusty Galaxy? by helioquake · · Score: 1

      You've got good eyes spotting it.

      It probably is a galaxy, though not necessarily terrifically bright as you call it. It's located in the part where the intervening gas of the Orion nebula (and the Galaxy) is thinner and it doesn't take much brightness for us to see through the cloud. You'd be right that it's a dusty galaxy (though it is not so uncommon).

      Cheers,

      -h

  12. Slashdotted: I'll describe the image to everyone by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    It's a tad blurry but it seems to be:

    Error: 500
    Too man connections

  13. But what about the galaxy? by cloudscout · · Score: 2, Funny

    Were they able to get nice, clear shots of Orion's belt?

    1. Re:But what about the galaxy? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Not belt. Orion's *bell*.

  14. The FAA disagrees by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Oxygen Requirements at Altitude.

    The FAA requires that all pilots flying their aircraft above 12,500 feet for 30 minutes or longer or at 14,000 feet or above during the entire flight must use supplemental oxygen. The amount required is 1 liter of oxygen per minute for every 10,000 feet. For example, at 18,000 feet there should be a flow of 1.8 liters per minute of oxygen available via a standard breathing device. The FAA requires there should be a device so attached to each breathing device that visually shows the flow of oxygen. (Nelson flow meters meet this FAA requirement.) The FAA also regulates that passengers must have supplemental oxygen available over 15,000 feet and that it is recommended that supplemental oxygen be used at night at altitudes over 5,000 feet.

    1. Re:The FAA disagrees by jericho4.0 · · Score: 1
      Blah, blah, blah. I stoped reading that thing when I ran into the silly rules about 'flying under the influence".

      --
      "A language that doesn't affect the way you think about programming, is not worth knowing" - Alan Perlis
    2. Re:The FAA disagrees by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      there is some difference between piloting a plane (where you ascend rapidly and must maintain reaction times at all costs) and living somewhere where you will get used to it and have time to find your limits under those conditions.

    3. Re:The FAA disagrees by Mycroft_VIII · · Score: 1

      That said low air pressure can still have some funny effects on people.
      I was watching something on pbs about some high altitude observatories (narrated by Johny Carson IIRC) and when discussing those effects he related the story about how durring construction one of the workers called down for advice because he couldn't get something to fit right he actually said (and meant) 'no matter how much I cut off it it's still to small'.
      The FAA rules are probably built with a wide safty margin, and apply where acclimatization doesn't have time to work.

      Mycroft

      --
      https://signup.leagueoflegends.com/?ref=4c3ed6600b6ea
  15. Nice! by kg_o.O · · Score: 1

    Wireframe please.

  16. Time to Die. by rocketsled · · Score: 4, Insightful

    "I have seen attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I have seen C-beams glitter in the darkness at the Tannhauser Gate. All these moments will be lost in time like tears in rain. Time to die."

  17. too bad by gameguy56 · · Score: 1

    Well, I for one, Welcome our new Master of Orion

  18. PNG vs. JPEG2 by 5n3ak3rp1mp · · Score: 1

    Not completely offtopic, but how prevalent is the JPEG2 format these days? I've been using it on OS X for some time now, I thought it was a standard, and I just checked and converting the "orion-centre-xlarge.png" to a lossless JP2 file caused it to go from 3.5MB to 1.1MB. Is there still spotty support of this format on Windows/*nix?

    1. Re:PNG vs. JPEG2 by dpp · · Score: 2, Informative

      I work for the Joint Astronomy Centre and did some of the work in putting those images together. If I remember correctly, I made the JPEGs from the PNGs with ImageMagick's "convert" tool. ImageMagick does seem to support JP2, but I don't know how much it is in general use (I haven't tried it myself) so I usually go for normal JPEGs in order to make sure as many people as possible can view the images.

      --
      This post is strictly my own opinion and not necessarily that of my employer.
    2. Re:PNG vs. JPEG2 by 5n3ak3rp1mp · · Score: 1

      Well, it would have been a simple matter to (in addition to the png and jpg download formats) add a third of JP2 and see what kind of response you got. Whoever used that version would have saved the server some bandwidth...

      I informally note that (from a lossless compression standpoint) JP2 is outstanding for photographs but PNG will occasionally beat JP2 in images with large swaths of a solid color (a frame of animation, for example).

  19. Definition of "Powerful"? by helioquake · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Not trying to take away anything from UKIRT (which is an awesome telescope from user's perspective), what do they mean by "most powerful" here? To me it means highest sensitivity to IR light or highest spatial resolution achievable with the combination of detector (which is the theme of this release) and its optical system (UKIRT). Apparently this instrument provides the largest field of view, which is cool indeed, but would that deserves "most powerful" title? It's a bit self-serving statement to me.

    Again, I'm not making light of the instrument. Some people -- those who perform sky survey, etc. -- would find it "most powerful" indeed. But others like me (spectroscopists) would find that statement rather weak. Images are cool, but it can tell you very little about the physical condition of these objects.

    1. Re:Definition of "Powerful"? by phirst · · Score: 3, Informative

      Actually, there's a fairly solid definition of 'how powerful' a survey camera is. They point is that we're using WFCAM to survey large areas of sky - they "power" of a survey camera in this sense is basically how long it takes to image a certain area of sky down to a certain sensitivity.

      WFCAM is so good because it provides both the huge field of view and also pritty good sensitivity. Certainly, a camera on a bigger telescope could be morse sensitive, but if its field of view is so much smaller that it ends up taking longer to map a big area of sky to the same sensitivity (by virtue of having to take many many seperate images in sucession then stitch them all together), then you've lost out in the long term.

      (Disclaimer: I'm the instrument scientist for WFCAM)

    2. Re:Definition of "Powerful"? by helioquake · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I agree with your comment, Phirst. It's probably the most powerful SURVEY camera that I have seen.
      But I use grating/echelle spectrographs mostly, both on ground and space. So from *my* heavily biased perspective, the title of "most powerful" doesn't sound right.

      I know it's just a matter of phrasing things. Like I said, this is a nifty instrument. I've always thought that detectors & instruments should define the quality and goodness of a telescope. You know, having an 8-m telescope with no working instrument just about do us no good...

      I'm off to a party now. Happy holiday to you in Hawaii. And to all of you.

      -h

    3. Re:Definition of "Powerful"? by Cabriel · · Score: 1

      Perhaps they mean "Powerful" in terms of magnification? It would seem normal to me to refer to a powerful telescope if it can magnify an image that much considering how powerful the magnification of the human eye is when compared to binoculars.

  20. Do we really learn anything from these images? by glrotate · · Score: 1

    Or are they simply multimillion dollar pretty pictures?

    1. Re:Do we really learn anything from these images? by Slashcrunch · · Score: 1

      To you and I, they are very impressive multimillion dollar pretty pictures.
      To the scientists that will study these pictures, I am sure there is much that can be learned from these pictures. And if not from these pics then maybe then next ones...

  21. Some techy trivial by phirst · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Disclaimer: I'm the instrument scientist for WFCAM.

    We did actually submit the story to slashdot, thinging they might want to scoop the BBC and The Register for a change. Got rejected, but anyway. I thought Slashdot types might be interested in some of the techy background to the instrument:

    WFCAM generates about 200GB of data per night. The data is handled (recorded then processed) by a cluster of 8 PCs (Ahem, why yes, they do run Linux), each of which has a ~650GB RAID array.

    An interesting point to note is that in total, the WFCAM system contains a total of about 60 hard disks. No commercial hard disk is rated for use above 10,000 feet, and UKIRT is at almost 14,000. Hard disks rely on atmospheric air pressure to keep the heads seperated from the disk surface, so we've even found keeping the RAIDs running had at times presented quite a challenge.

    Also, of course the PCs are fan cooled. Fan cooling doesn't work too well when there's only 60% of the air they're used to (atmospheric pressure on the summit of Mauna Kea is about 60% that at sea level), and with the combination of 2.8GHz Xeons and half a dozen disks in each 3U rackmount machine, we had to fairly seriosuly beef up the case fans to keep the machines at a sane temperature.

    1. Re:Some techy trivial by Yorrike · · Score: 1

      A quick question; Is the entire WFCAM team posting in this thread? I'm just wondering if you guys do nothing but read slashdot while you're waiting for the next pic to come through...

      --

      Looks can be deceiving. Or CAN they?

    2. Re:Some techy trivial by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Am I missing something?

      Why do you have to do all the processing & storage on site? It can't be done remotely? Say for example, in an environmentally controlled co-location facility? Hell anywhere besides 14,000 feet?

      Seems like a no brainer to me.

  22. a more amazing infrared image, IMHO by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
    stars whirling around the central black hole of our Milky Way galaxy

    wasn't taken with WFCAM, though...

  23. Re:Slashdotted: I'll describe the image to everyon by hps5+(whois+hps5) · · Score: 1

    Not too bad - see our usage page.

    --
    Haven't you heard, it's a battle of words... ...and most of them are lies.
  24. So... by Reteo+Varala · · Score: 1

    Has anyone seen the Guardian yet?

    --
    The Penguin Producer
  25. face? by Saltheart · · Score: 1

    Is it just me or does one of the cloud formations look remarkably like a face?