Subaru Telescope’s New Compound Eye to Start Exploring the Universe in February
Christopher Boggess (left) and Teiji Chiba (right), the Subaru Telescope Technicians from Hawai‘i, are installing the PFS Prime Focus Instrument at about 20 meters (more than 60 feet) height from the observation floor. (Credit: PFS Project/NAOJ)
The Subaru Telescope studies objects that are relatively close together in the distant universe, and it is enhancing its capabilities with a new instrument called the Prime Focus Spectrograph (PFS). The PFS is a powerful compound eye, a term used to describe the vision of insects.
While the compound eye of an insect is powerful because it can focus and take in light from multiple directions at once, the PFS is even more complex. It allows the telescope to simultaneously observe 2,400 celestial bodies with 2,400 prisms scattered across the telescope's ultra-wide field of view, capturing cosmic rainbows and allowing for detailed exploration of the universe and a more precise understanding of the formation and evolution of galaxies and the universe. With the new capabilities provided by the PFS, the Subaru Telescope is entering its “Subaru Telescope 2.0” era.
The Subaru Telescope played a central role by participating in development, overseeing project coordination, and being responsible for the acceptance and operation of the instrument. The Prime Focus Spectrograph, however, is the result of 15 years of hard work and international collaboration between over 20 research institutions based in Japan, the United States, France, Brazil, Taiwan, Germany, and China, and Hawaiʻi-based scientists, engineers, and technicians. Parts and modules of the PDS were developed and assembled all around the world before making their way to the Subaru Telescope on Maunakea.
International collaborations are no small feat, but they are a rewarding process that brings the international astronomy community closer together. Naoyuki Tamura, a professor at the Subaru Telescope at NAOJ and the PFS Project Manager, knows that discoveries like this bring together more than observatories and researchers; they bring together local communities.
“During the manufacturing, assembly, and testing processes, I have been just continuing efforts to bring people and teams together who are dispersed across different institutes. It is deeply moving to see it come together as a single instrument system. However, this is just a stepping stone towards ultimate goals such as continuing the operation for a long term, producing unprecedented scientific outputs, and sharing exciting news from Maunakea with the local community to the fullest. The discoveries that will be made with this cutting-edge instrument are something all of the people of Hawai’i can be proud of; to be at the center of such a meaningful international collaboration and human endeavor.”
The PFS team plans to conduct a large-sky survey program over the next five years, utilizing 360 nights of telescope time to take spectra of millions of distant galaxies and hundreds of thousands of stars.
