In another landmark achievement for the country’s young space program, China has officially deployed the world’s first lobster-eye telescope into orbit.
Known as the ‘Einstein Probe’, the advanced satellite observatory can detect far-off cosmic phenomena, including black holes and neutron stars.
A Long March 2C liquid fuel rocket successfully launched the Einstein Probe from the Xichang Sattelite Launch Centre, taking just under 60 minutes to settle into a low orbit 600 kilometres above sea level, according to the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation.
Early examples of lobster eye optics were introduced to the scientific community more than 40 years ago by Roger Angel. The design mimics the structure of lobster, mantis shrimp and several other crustacean species that are composed of numerous long tube-like cells that reflect even the most minute amounts of incoming light, granting them unrivalled visual acuity in the animal kingdom.
The Einstein Probe was designed by the Chinese Academy of Sciences, with assistance from a multinational team of institutions, including the European Space Agency and the Munich-based Max Planck Institute of Extraterrestrial Physics.
It consists of two major components, the Wide-field X-Ray Telescope (WXT) and the Follow-up X-Ray Telescope (FTX).
Reminiscent of the eye of a lobster, the WXT’s internal optics are occupied by thousands of hollow fibres that redirect photons toward detectors. The FTX has a significantly narrower field of vision relative to the WTX but can focus on points of interest identified by the WTX and bring them into sharper focus once located.
Working in conjunction with one another, the two-piece array can quickly and accurately monitor unique astronomical occurrences.
According to the European Space Agency, the highly sophisticated instrument allows the Einstein Probe to observe nearly 10 percent of the visible universe in one shot.
Over the next several months, the Einstein Probe’s operational team will put the state-of-the-art telescope through its paces, testing and adjusting its instruments where required, according to the project’s official press release.
Once calibrated, it will spend at least three years watching the night sky in steady low-earth orbit, completing one orbit of the globe in just over an hour and a half and the entire night sky after just three complete orbits.
Astronomers are hopeful the probe can provide valuable insight into many little-understood cosmic events, such as black holes and their gravitational effect on their surroundings, supernova explosions and neutron star collisions.
https://www.space.com/china-launches-einstein-probe-black-holes-x-ray
https://edition.cnn.com/2024/01/10/world/einstein-probe-launch-china-scn/index.html
