Planck's First Light Yields

[Friul]

The picture is pretty large, so I will just include a link:  http://www.esa.int/images/FIRST_LIGHT_SURVEY.jpg

ESA's Planck microwave observatory - the first European mission designed to study the Cosmic Microwave Background, the relic radiation from the Big Bang - started regularly surveying the sky from its vantage point at L2 on 13 August 2009.  Prior to this the two instruments of this modern day 'time machine' had been fine-tuned for optimum performance. Both instruments have demonstrated excellent characteristics so far, fulfilling expectations from ground tests. In preparation for routine scientific operations, their long-term stability has been verified by conducting a first 'trial' survey – the First Light Survey.

Source:  ESA

 

[EofK]

Awesome!

 

[scamandrius]

Very cool.

 

[Friul]

In case some do not know where L2 (2nd Lagrangian Point) is:

 

[Ebor]

Very cool indeed!

and to quote from "The L5 Song" (a filk song from the 70s) for fun

"Home, home on Lagrange
Where the space debris always collects..."

 

[Catherine]

Nice one, Nebelpfade.

 

[mike]

I remember that in 1st year in High School we had to calculate the distance from the Earth to the points where Earth's gravity and Moon's gravity are the same (L1 and L2). The only one problem was that quadratic equations are taught on 2nd year.

Our Physics teacher couldn't imagine that. She showed us how to calculate the discriminant and all the rest but we couldn't understand anything and automatically copied her calculations.

 

[ytterbiumanalyst]

Wow. Brilliant.