Written by Samah Labib
Saturday, June 10, 2023 03:00 AM
With increasing numbers Satellites In the sky, astronomers have repeatedly expressed concern about how these satellites may affect scientific research, and earlier this year.
A study of Hubble Space Telescope observations showed how some images were destroyed by streaks of light coming from satellites – and while only a small percentage of Hubble images were affected, the authors raised concerns that with the number of satellites expected to explode in the next decade the problem could become serious.
Dave Stark of STScI said in a statement, astronomers at the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI), which now runs Hubble, have come up with a tool to manipulate satellite lines in Hubble images.
We have developed a new satellite trajectory tool that is an improvement over previous satellite programs because it is much more sensitive. So we think it would be better to locate and remove satellite tracks in Hubble images.”
The tool works by looking for trails in images from one of Hubble’s cameras, the Advanced Camera for Surveys. This camera has a very wide field of view, which means that it captures a large portion of the sky at once. This is useful in this case because it means that the tracks from the satellites will cross a very small percentage of the image.
