From a mountaintop in Chile, under clear dark skies, the Simonyi Survey Telescope at the NSF–DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory has officially begun the Legacy Survey of Space and Time (). The 10-year survey will create the most comprehensive, cinematic record of the universe in history. Over the next decade, Rubin will observe the entire southern sky every few nights to create an ultra-wide, ultra-high-definition time-lapse record of our universe.Ěý

“The decision to officially begin the LSST was made after a period of system optimization and a careful operational review of technical readiness, data system performance and scientific validation,” said , a 91±¬ÁĎ professor of astronomy and head of LSST. “The 91±¬ÁĎ Rubin team played a central role in optimizing the observatory and helping prepare it for the start of full survey operations.”

The Simonyi Survey Telescope’s unique design combines enormous light-collecting power, the ability to move rapidly across the sky and a wide field of view. The attached 3,200-megapixel camera — the largest digital camera in the world — is now capturing a new, detailed image approximately every 40 seconds. Using a telescope with this speed and sensitivity, Rubin is capable of catching faint objects and fleeting events with reliability and consistency every night.

Over the next decade, Rubin will illuminate a treasure trove of discoveries: pulsating stars, supernova explosions, the fossil record of galaxies, clues to the mysteries of dark energy and dark matter, and entirely new phenomena we’ve never seen before. Some cosmic processes unfold slowly, unpredictably or incredibly rarely, which is why a 10-year survey is essential. By returning to each point in the sky about 800 times over a decade, Rubin data will provide the scientific community with deep, time-rich views needed to uncover subtle events, capture moving objects and study the accelerating expansion of the universe.

This milestone follows the Rubin First Look event that took place in June 2025, which was followed by final commissioning work, an operational readiness review and the beginning of the alert stream.

Each night, Rubin collects approximately 10 terabytes of data and produces as many as seven million alerts of changes in the night sky. These alerts stream to : automated systems that sort and classify these changes so scientists can act quickly. 91±¬ÁĎ researchers led by , research associate professor of astronomy, developed the alert pipeline.

“Astronomers have already used Rubin’s public alerts to discover and follow up hundreds of transient phenomena during the early optimization period,” Bellm said. “We can expect many more exciting discoveries with the start of the full survey.”

Not only is Rubin helping to unlock the mysteries of the distant universe, it is also the most powerful solar system discovery machine ever built. By taking about a thousand images every night, Rubin is compiling a detailed census of our solar system, including millions of asteroids and comets. In just a month and a half, during early optimization surveys, Rubin discovered over 11,000 never-before-seen asteroids, including 33 near-Earth objects and 380 trans-Neptunian objects.

When the LSST is complete, the final dataset will contain billions of objects with trillions of measurements, all accessible through regular data releases. This is the first time so much astronomical data will be available to so many people, opening the door to new kinds of discovery by both scientists and the public. Rubin invites anyone in the world to engage with its data and explore the dynamic universe in ways never before possible.

“It is amazing and humbling to be here at this time and place as we start the Legacy Survey of Space and Time, after more than two decades of incredible work by our dedicated team,” said Bob Blum, director of Rubin Observatory at NSF NOIRLab. “Rubin Observatory is for everyone; the LSST will change how we do astronomy and astrophysics, allowing researchers anywhere to participate in cutting-edge science.”

Visit to follow the status of the LSST in real time.

Rubin Observatory is jointly operated by NSF NOIRLab and SLAC. Observatory operations are funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation and the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Science.

For more information, contact Ivezić at ivezic@astro.washington.edu.

This story was adapted from a press release by .

A new era of astronomy and astrophysics began Monday when the first images captured by the NSF–DOE were released, demonstrating the extraordinary capabilities of the new telescope and the world’s largest digital camera.

Officials in Washington, D.C., unveiled large, ultra-high-definition images and videos, as well as discoveries of thousands of new asteroids. Astronomers and researchers around the world watched along at viewing parties, including at the 91±¬ÁĎ’s Planetarium.

The images offer a preview of the most comprehensive census of the solar system scientists have ever conducted, and a peek into the exponential increase in discoveries and understanding of the cosmos this new telescope will make possible.

The 91±¬ÁĎ was one of the founding members of Rubin’s ambitious undertaking and will play a key role in making sense of the discoveries. 91±¬ÁĎ scientists and engineers were critical in advocating for the project, designing the observatory and developing the software that will analyze the petabytes of data from Rubin’s telescope, including the asteroid discovery algorithms.

“91±¬ÁĎ faculty recognized early on that dreaming big about Rubin’s capabilities and leading the scientific charge would shape our knowledge of the solar system and propel innovation in data science not only in astrophysics but also across disciplines,” said 91±¬ÁĎ Provost Tricia R. Serio. “We often talk about the impact the 91±¬ÁĎ is making here and around the world. This project will take us far into space and give us information about the very origins of the universe and set the stage for future discoveries we can’t even imagine today.”

From its peak in the Chilean Andes, Rubin’s Simonyi Survey Telescope will scan the sky with its 8.4-meter mirror and enormous 3,200-megapixel camera, the largest digital camera in the world. The telescope’s sight path, the pace and frequency of observations and the vast field of vision required a new type of discovery algorithm to reliably make sense of the troves of data collected. Scientists and researchers at the 91±¬ÁĎ worked across disciplines to evolve data science and computer science to meet Rubin’s demands.

In 2017, the 91±¬ÁĎ â€” with founding support from the Charles and Lisa Simonyi Fund for Arts and Sciences — established the , or DiRAC. The Institute, part of the , aims to be an interdisciplinary hub to address fundamental questions about the origins and evolution of the universe. Leaders recognized that the future of astrophysics relied on using software as the chief instrument for this exploration. Combined with the 91±¬ÁĎ’s and the deep connections to the Pacific Northwest’s tech community, DiRAC has developed a global reputation for working toward new discoveries.

As the Rubin sets out on a 10-year mission to conduct the Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST), software created at the 91±¬ÁĎ will be pivotal as scientists advance understanding of the cosmos and the origins of the solar system. 91±¬ÁĎ’s faculty, students and staff have played key roles in the construction of this new facility They’ve also been pivotal in developing the algorithms that keep the telescope image sharp and creating the codes for mapping the solar system and discovering the most energetic and rarest phenomena in what astrophysicists call the ” 91±¬ÁĎ’s , a professor of astronomy, is the director of the federally-funded Rubin Construction Project.Ěý

Unlike other telescopes — which tend to focus and “zoom in” on a few objects of interest — Rubin is alone in the capability to quickly and repeatedly map the entire visible sky.Ěý

“Rubin has the unprecedented capacity to capture the cosmos,” said , a professor of astronomy and director of 91±¬ÁĎ’s . He’s also the co-principal investigator of the supported LSST Interdisciplinary Network for Collaboration and Computing (LINCC) Frameworks program to develop state-of-the-art analysis techniques capable of meeting Rubin’s scale and complexity.

“Rubin will deliver the largest map the universe ever made: tens of billions of galaxies, billions of stars and millions of new small bodies in our own solar system. It’s a data analysis endeavor of epic proportions,” Connolly said.Ěý

For each object Rubin observes, there will be much more than a static image, the technology will produce a thousand-frame movie: trillions of measurements of billions of objects, said , a research associate professor and the science lead of Rubin’s time-domain software team.

“With these data, scientists will better understand the universe, chronicle its evolution, and delve into science ranging from dangerous asteroids to the mysteries of dark energy,” Bellm said.

For example, the 91±¬ÁĎ’s team helped create simulation software to predict Rubin’s discoveries. The research found that the telescope will map more than 5 million main-belt asteroids, 127,000 near-Earth objects, 109,000 Trojan asteroids that share Jupiter’s orbit, 37,000 trans-Neptunian objects and about 2,000 Centaurs, or orbit-crossing objects.Ěý

These objects, revealed in color and in more detail than was previously possible, help tell the story of the solar system’s origins, said , a professor of astronomy and the principal investigator of 91±¬ÁĎ’s Rubin team.

Juric said that Rubin will help answer some fundamental questions: How did the planets form? Is there an unknown planet hiding in the outskirts of our solar system? Did comets bring water to the Earth? Or asteroids? And are there any that could still collide with us today?

“The first look we share today is a glimpse into the transformational capacity Rubin will bring to answer questions like these,” Juric said.

The work to support the Rubin Observatory hasn’t been limited to 91±¬ÁĎ faculty. Numerous 91±¬ÁĎ undergraduate and doctoral students have played contributing roles, authoring important journal articles, developing simulation software and writing complex computer codes.Ěý

Exposure to the LSST has helped prepare students to succeed post graduation, whether applying for work in industry or moving onto advanced academic degrees.

“Developing cloud-based analytics platforms, or building pipelines to process large amounts of imaging data, are skills that allow one to do not just cutting-edge astronomy but also any other data-intensive problem,” said Steven Stetzler, who recently completed doctoral work at 91±¬ÁĎ and now holds a postdoctoral appointment at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

For more information, contact Juric at mjuric@uw.edu or James Davenport at jrad@uw.edu.Ěý

With a key funding approval, the , an international astronomy project of which the 91±¬ÁĎ is a founding member, is taking a major step toward becoming a reality.

The National Science Foundation agreed Friday to support the in managing construction of the long-planned telescope — called the LSST for short — to be built on Cerro Pachón, a mountain in northern Chile.

“The LSST is one of the most exciting experiments in astrophysics today,” said , 91±¬ÁĎ professor of astronomy, who heads the 91±¬ÁĎ group managing data for the telescope. “When it comes online at the end of this decade, it could completely transform our knowledge of our universe, from understanding how dark energy drives the expansion of the universe, to identifying asteroids that may one day impact the Earth.”

Connolly is one of several . Others include , professor of astronomy and project scientist; , research associate professor; Mario Juric, astronomy professor; and research associates , , Scott Daniel and , as well as graduate student .

The telescope is expected to see (or its first use) in 2019 and begin its decade of full science operations in 2022. The NSF construction budget will not exceed $473 million and annual operation costs have been estimated at $40 million, in 2013 dollars.

When operational, the telescope will scan the entire visible sky every few nights from its mountaintop location, in time producing an unprecedented astronomical survey of the universe with its 27.5-foot ground based telescope. Its data will be available to the public as well as scientists. 91±¬ÁĎ work on the telescope includes building the software tools to detect nightly changes in the sky and alert astronomers globally to anything new.

The project is a partnership between the NSF and the Department of Energy. The NSF will oversee the telescope, site, data management system and education and outreach, while the Energy Department will provide the camera and related instrumentation.

The Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy is a consortium of 39 U.S. institutions and six international affiliates. The telescope passed its final design review by the NSF in December of 2013. The Energy Department’s approval of the telescope’s camera is expected this fall.

The 91±¬ÁĎ’s Connolly said the huge flow of data from the telescope will “open up the window of time,” creating a digital movie of the universe. This will be used to create models “for how our universe works — models that can predict its future and explain its past.”

• Adapted from a by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy.