The European Space Telescope “Euclid” published on Tuesday the first pictures it took of the universe, showing a dazzling nebula resembling a horse’s head, and distant galaxies that had never been seen before, and including “indirect evidence” of the existence of dark matter.
Announcement
The European Space Telescope “Euclid” published the first images it took of the universe, showing a dazzling nebula resembling a horse’s head and distant galaxies that had never been seen before, and including “indirect evidence” of the existence of dark matter.
Last July, Euclid launched a mission that was the first of its kind internationally, aiming to uncover two cosmic mysteries: dark matter and dark energy.
The telescope accomplishes its mission by mapping a third of the sky, which includes two billion galaxies, to create what has been described as the most accurate 3D map of the universe.
After the space telescope reached another telescope, the James Webb, at a monitoring point located about 1.5 million kilometers from Earth, the European probe began sending the first observation results it is carrying out, and they were revealed on Tuesday from the European Space Operations Center in Darmstadt, Germany.
A statement quoted the head of the European Space Agency, Joseph Aschbacher, as saying that these five images, which were revealed by the European Space Operations Center in Darmstadt, Germany, are “astonishing and a reminder of the importance of going to space to learn more about the secrets of the universe.”
Among these images, one is of the Horsehead Nebula, within the nearby Orion constellation, spiral galaxies, and others are “irregular.”
The scientific director of the project, Rene Lorig, explained that the most “exciting” image is the image of the Perseus Cluster, which is a distant group that includes more than a thousand galaxies, as more than a hundred thousand additional galaxies were found in the background, some of which are located ten billion light-years away and had not been observed before.
The astronomer and physicist at the French Atomic Energy Commission, a member of the Euclid Alliance, explained that the peculiarity of this telescope lies in its having a wide field of view “unprecedented in the history of astronomy,” allowing it to explore the early ages of the universe, while James Webb in comparison With him it is as if he is “looking at the sky through the hole of a needle.”
Thanks to this wide vision, the telescope equipped with two instruments (optical and near-infrared) can capture such wide and high-resolution images. He did all this very quickly, with the first five images taking only about eight hours.
The European Space Agency describes Euclid as the “Dark Universe Detective,” tasked with investigating why 95 percent of the universe is made up of dark matter and dark energy, about which science lacks sufficient data.
Dark matter, which is attractive, is considered “glue for galaxies, preventing stars from being thrown out.” ESA Scientific Director Carol Mundell explained that dark, repulsive energy “is the driving force behind the accelerating expansion of the universe.”
René Lorig noted that the first batch of Euclid images revealed “indirect evidence” of the existence of dark matter. It is “surprising,” for example, that the probe did not detect any stars tracking the globular cluster NGC 6397, which is a cluster of stars. He added, “One theory is that there may be dark matter around us.”
The telescope will publish its second batch of images in January, and the European mission is expected to continue until at least 2029.
Additional sources • AFP
