«Euclid» explores the evolution of the «dark universe»
The “Euclid” (Euclid) goes in search of the secrets of the dark universe. The European Space Agency mission launches on a SpaceX rocket from Florida to shed light on dark energy and dark matter.
Photo: esa.int
A European-made orbiting satellite was launched into space on Saturday from Florida on a mission to shed new light on dark energy and dark matter, mysterious cosmic forces that scientists say make up 95% of the known universe, Reuters reports.
The Euclid telescope, named after the ancient Greek mathematician known as the “father of geometry,” was placed in the cargo bay of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket that lifted off around 11 a.m. ET (1500 GMT) from the Space Force Station at Cape Canaveral.
New results from a $1.4 billion European Space Agency (ESA) mission spanning at least six years are expected to change astrophysics and perhaps our understanding of the nature of gravity.
After a short space flight » Euclid was to be released from a SpaceX Falcon 9 for a month-long journey to a solar-orbiting destination nearly 1 million miles (1.6 million km) from Earth—a position of gravitational stability between Earth and the Sun called Lagrange Point Two, or L2.
From there, Euclid explores the evolution of the «dark universe» using a wide-angle telescope to observe galaxies up to 10 billion light-years from Earth, in the vast expanse beyond our own Milky Way galaxy.
As noted by Reuters , the 2-ton spacecraft is also equipped with instruments designed to measure the intensity and infrared spectra of these galaxies in such a way as to accurately determine their distances.
The mission focuses on two fundamental components of the dark universe. One is dark matter, an invisible but theoretically influential «cosmic framework» that is thought to give shape and texture to the cosmos. The other is dark energy, an equally mysterious force believed to explain why the expansion of the universe is accelerating, explains Reuters.
Mission capabilities are reflected in the Euclid research scope. Scientists estimate that dark energy and dark matter together make up 95% of the cosmos, while ordinary matter that we can see is only 5%.
According to Reuters, Euclid was entirely designed and built by the European Space Agency, with NASA providing photodetectors for its near-infrared instrument. The Euclid Consortium brings together more than 2000 scientists from 13 European countries, the USA, Canada and Japan.
This mission has been in development for ten years, initially it was supposed to go into space on a Russian Soyuz rocket. But the launch plans were moved to SpaceX, Elon Musk's California venture, after the start of the conflict in Ukraine and because no space was available in the European Arianne rocket program.
While the space telescope James Webb, launched by NASA late last year, allows astronomers to capture the objects of the early Universe with unprecedented clarity, Euclid is designed to reveal the hidden structure and mechanics of the cosmos, meticulously mapping a huge region of the observable Universe in 3D — more than 1 billion galaxies.
Dark matter and dark energy cannot be directly detected, but their properties are «encoded in the shapes and arrangements of galaxies,» says astrophysicist Jason Rhodes, lead scientist for Project Euclid at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory near Los Angeles. “Measuring the shapes and positions of galaxies allows us to infer the properties of dark matter and dark energy,” Rhodes said on Friday.
Data will be gathered as Euclid maps the last 10 billion years of cosmic history in a third of the sky, looking outward and thus back in time to an era in the universe that astronomers call «cosmic noon» when most stars.
Scientists say observing subtle but distinct changes in the shape and arrangement of galaxies over vast spans of time and space will reveal subtle variations in cosmic acceleration, indirectly revealing the forces of dark energy.
Euclid will also help unravel the nature of dark matter by measuring an effect called gravitational lensing, which causes subtle distortions in the visible shapes of galaxies and is attributed to the presence of invisible material warping the fabric of space.
Through understanding of dark energy and Matter scientists hope to better understand the formation and distribution of galaxies along the so-called cosmic web of the universe.
According to Yannick Mellier, head of the Euclid consortium and astronomer at the Paris Institute of Astrophysics, Euclid will be “a goldmine for all areas of astronomy for several decades” .