World's Largest Digital Camera Funded
If you are in the market for a great pro-level digital camera, you might take a look at the Nikon D4: a 16. 2 MP unit that lists for
$5,999.99 (plus lenses). It's pretty impressive, but how about a
3,200 MP camera — the final cost of which has been estimated
at about $167 million? We're talking about the centerpiece of
the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST) which recently
received key "Critical Decision 2" approval from the US
Department of Energy. The camera — scheduled to be in
operation atop a mountain in Cerro Pachón, Chile, by 2022 —
will be the size of a small car and weigh more than three tons.
Operated by the DOE's Stanford Linear Accelerator Center
(SLAC) and National Accelerator Laboratory
( www6.slac.stanford.edu), it is designed to help researchers
study galaxy formation, track hazardous asteroids, grab a look at
exploding stars, and gain a better understanding of enigmatic
dark matter and dark energy which together make up 95
percent of the universe. According to SLAC, it will produce the
widest, deepest, and fastest views of the night sky ever
observed. Over a ten year period, the observatory will detect
tens of billions of objects and create movies of the sky with
unprecedented details.
"The telescope is a key part of the long-term strategy to
study dark energy and other scientific topics in the United States
and elsewhere," said David MacFarlane, SLAC's director of
particle physics and astrophysics. "SLAC places high priority on
the successful development and construction of the LSST
camera and is very pleased that the project has achieved this
major approval milestone."
Components of the camera will be built by an international
collaboration of labs and universities, including DOE's
Brookhaven National Lab, Lawrence Livermore National Lab,
and SLAC itself, where the camera will be assembled and tested.
▲
ADVANCED TECHNOLOGY Levitation Made Simple
Levitation has long been a staple concept for folks, ranging from Hindu gurus to magicians. It is a
pretty difficult thing to achieve outside the world of
illusion and fakery, but there are a few real methods
including magnetic and acoustic levitation — the latter
of which is used for "containerless processing" of
various materials. It involves suspending an object
between a sound source and a reflector using the
reflected acoustic waves.
Until recently, this has required a very precise
setup in which the source and reflector had to be
located at fixed resonant distances, which makes it
difficult to control the levitated objects. However,
researchers with the University of São Paulo
( www5.usp.br) have devised an instrument that can
make a small object hover while exercising much
greater control over it.
The instrument demonstrates that it is possible to
build a practical nonresonant device, i.e., one that
does not require a fixed separation between the two
main components. Moreover, it shows that levitation
can do more than just trap objects in a fixed position;
it can also transport them through short distances in
space. According to Marco Aurélio Brizzotti Andrade,
who led the research, "Modern factories have
hundreds of robots to move parts from one place to
another. Why not try to do the same without
touching the parts to be transported?"
Unfortunately, his levitator can lift only very light
objects at this point; it was tested with 3 mm blobs of
polystyrene. "The next step is to improve the device
to levitate heavier materials," Andrade noted. ▲
■ Ultrasonic emitter (top) and reflector
(bottom) suspend polystyrene blobs in
acoustic standing waves.
■ BY JEFF ECKERT TECHKNOWLEDGEY 2015
8 April 2015
■ Artist's rendering of the LSST camera.