ESA launches the Euclid telescope from Cape Canaveral (USA) to create the largest 3D map of the universe

June 30 () –

European Space Agency has planned launch this Saturday, July 1, the Euclid telescope from the Cape Canaveral station in Florida (USA), with the mission of creating a larger and more accurate 3D map of the Universe.

To do this, the telescope will observe billions of galaxies up to distances of ten billion light years, precisely measuring the position and shapes of galaxies in visible light and inferring their distances, as indicated by the Institute of Astrophysics (IAC) in a statement.

“Euclid will help us explore how the universe has expanded and how its structure has formed throughout cosmic history.which may reveal more about the role of gravity and the nature of dark energy and dark matter”, explained the ICE-CSIC, IEEC researcher and member of the board of directors of the Euclid Consortium, Francisco Castander.

According to current models, these dark components account for about 95% of the matter and energy content of the Universe, and affect the movement and distribution of visible sources, such as galaxies, even though they do not emit or absorb light. For this reason, science has not yet been able to determine what they are.

Spain has been part of the Consortium that has promoted the mission from its origin and has participated in the instrumental development of the project and will contribute to scientific exploitation.

Thus, several Spanish institutions, among which is the IAC, have worked for more than eleven years on this mission. The Institute has collaborated in the design, construction and validation of the control electronics of one of its two on-board instruments.

Euclid’s combination of sensitivity, spatial resolution, data homogeneity, and spectral information is intended to be useful for many areas of astrophysics.

“The data from the mission will provide an extraordinary legacy that will allow us to expand our knowledge about the formation and evolution of galaxies and, in particular, of the less luminous stars of the Milky Way.“, points out the director of the IAC and also a member of the board of directors of the Euclid Consortium, Rafael Rebolo.

After a month of space travel, the telescope will reach its destination to orbit at the second Lagrange point (L2) of the Sun-Earth system, 1.5 million kilometers from Earth in the opposite direction to the Sun.

There, Euclid will capture solar energy to supply himself with energy and at the same time point his telescope into deep space. Next, for about two months it will carry out different tests to verify that all its components and instruments work correctly. Finally, three months after liftoff from it, Euclid will begin mapping the dark universe for the six years the mission is expected to last.