[Nottingham] The eye of GAIA

[Martin]

Folks,

For those of you at one of our talks earlier this year, there's a part
of that in the recent news:


A billion pixels for a billion stars
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15242383

"… whereas Hubble’s premier instrument, the Wide Field Camera 3,
incorporates just two e2v CCDs side by side, the sensor system the
company has just completed includes 106 CCDs.

This huge (nearly one billion pixels) array will be fitted to the
European Space Agency’s Gaia satellite, due for launch in June 2013.
…"


There is a good summary given of the astronomical numbers involved there.


All as was shown at:

GAIA – How to take a Galactic Census
http://nlug.ml1.co.uk/2011/06/gaia-how-to-take-a-galactic-census/270


Still impressive stuff. Hopefully it will all come together so that we
can find where we are!

Cheers,
Martin