On the night of June 30, a large survey telescope designed to map the ever-changing universe began full-scale operations at the Vera C. Rubin Observatory in Chile. This marks a major shift in how we gather knowledge about our planet’s immediate and distant surroundings. Over the course of three nights, the telescope captures images of the entire southern sky—and it will repeat this process for ten years. As a result, we will obtain an astronomical amount of data and records of what changes in the sky and how. This will allow us to explore the universe in ways that were previously inaccessible to us.
“Thanks to the large survey telescope, we will discover tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of asteroids in our solar system, millions of new variable stars in our galaxy, and we will observe billions of galaxies—their shapes, their distortions, and their gravitational lensing. We’ll use the observatory’s second very powerful tool for analysis. A huge number of these objects will be photographed, and we’ll be able to harness the power of statistics to analyze them,” says Michael Prouza, explaining the significance of the Vera C. Rubin Observatory. The astrophysicist and director of the Institute of Physics of the Czech Academy of Sciences is the Czech Republic’s official representative on the observatory’s board.
Every night, the Vera C. Rubin Observatory will detect millions of changes in the sky. The Czech team from the Institute of Physics of the Czech Academy of Sciences will search this data stream for cosmic catastrophes—explosions of distant supernovae and the extremely rare moments when a supermassive black hole tears apart a star that has strayed too close to it.
Development of the observatory began 25 years ago. It was built on Cerro Pachón in northern Chile, where dry air, minimal cloud cover, and a dark sky create ideal conditions for observation. The telescope is equipped with the largest digital camera ever built, connected to a powerful data-processing system. The telescope surpasses other survey telescopes in terms of the size of its primary mirror. With a diameter of 8.4 meters (roughly the height of a three-story building), it can gather much more light and detect much fainter objects than other survey telescopes. Nearly three thousand people from many parts of the world worked on the construction and testing of the observatory. Thousands more will make use of the data the telescope will collect over ten years of operational service.
Last spring, the telescope collected its first data and ceremoniously made it available to the public through the “First Light” event, which took place in June 2025 at many locations around the world, including Prague. This was followed by a trial operation period, during which the telescope spent part of the night capturing its first images of the sky, while technicians and software specialists continuously fine-tuned the observatory’s optical and imaging systems. “At the top of the observatory, several hundred servers process the data so that within 60 seconds we have information about what’s in the sky. Within a few seconds of capturing an image, we also find out how well—or poorly—the telescope is focused, so we can adjust the optical settings,” says Petr Kubánek, a software engineer and member of the team that programs parts of the telescope’s control system.
Commissioning the telescope, including the calibration of the optics and control systems, took a full year instead of the planned six months. “We had to deal with several technical problems; the most significant one involved mirror cooling. The problem of balancing the temperature of the telescope’s mirror with the ambient temperature has been known since the 1960s. Here, a complication arose because the primary mirror consists of two sections of different thicknesses, so the cooling process was uneven. The mirror was manufactured in Arizona, and it wasn’t until it was transported to the site and installed in Chile that we were able to begin testing its response to climatic conditions and temperature changes directly on site at Cerro Pachón, at an altitude of 2,682 meters,” explains Petr Kubánek.
There was also a delay of several days due to earthquakes. The area is known for frequent minor and moderate tremors. The entire system is designed to handle this—when vibrations are detected, the system automatically switches to safety mode: it halts observations, parks the telescope, and locks the fine movements of the active optics. Everything was theoretically ready, but it could not be tested until a stronger earthquake occurred. After the first such practical test, the telescope’s engineers adjusted the system’s behavior parameters and are waiting for another opportunity to test it during the next significant earthquake.
Below in the gallery, you'll find the first detailed images of the night sky taken by the Vera C. Rubin Observatory.
Ocean of Stars
This 1.7-gigapixel image of a field of stars in the constellation Lupus showcases the unprecedented view of the Universe that NSF–DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory gives us. Equipped with the LSST Camera — the largest digital camera in the world — Rubin combines a wide view of the sky with the ability to detect extremely faint objects. With this capability, Rubin can reveal details of the cosmos across an enormous range of scales, from distant galaxies, to individual stars, to the wispy clouds of dust spread throughout our galaxy.
The faint, glowing clouds spread across this image are galactic cirrus: clouds of interstellar gas and dust that can be seen in the foreground of the Milky Way. Rubin’s ability to capture scenes like this in unmatched detail will open new windows into the structure of our galaxy and the Universe beyond it.
The depth of NSF–DOE Rubin’s LSST
This infographic shows how combining multiple exposures reveals far more detail than a single exposure can capture. By adding together many Rubin Observatory images of the same field, we can see more light, bring out fainter objects, and create a sharper, more detailed view of the Universe.
Ocean of Stars Excerpts
This 1.7-gigapixel image of a field of stars in the constellation Lupus showcases the unprecedented view of the Universe that NSF–DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory gives us. Equipped with the LSST Camera — the largest digital camera in the world — Rubin combines a wide view of the sky with the ability to detect extremely faint objects. With this capability, Rubin can reveal details of the cosmos across an enormous range of scales, from distant galaxies, to individual stars, to the wispy clouds of dust spread throughout our galaxy.
The faint, glowing clouds spread across this image are galactic cirrus: clouds of interstellar gas and dust that can be seen in the foreground of the Milky Way. Rubin’s ability to capture scenes like this in unmatched detail will open new windows into the structure of our galaxy and the Universe beyond it.
NSF–DOE Rubin’s LSST coverage
How much sky can Rubin observe in a single week? This map shows a representative week of Rubin Observatory observations for the Legacy Survey of Space and Time. The color of the tile represents the filter used for each exposure (u, g, r, i, z, and y), revealing how Rubin rapidly builds a multicolor map of the Universe.
NSF–DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory by the numbers
This infographic showcases the numbers behind NSF–DOE Rubin Observatory’s Legacy Survey of Space and Time — a major new exploration of the night sky that will transform our understanding of the Universe.
You can find full-resolution photos and the press release in our media kit.