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Abstract: |
Fueled by advances in software, microelectronics,
and large optics fabrication, a new type of sky survey is being
designed. In a relentless campaign of 15 second exposures, the
Large Synoptic Survey Telescope will cover the sky deeply every
few nights, opening a new window on faint objects that change or
move: exploding supernovae, potentially hazardous near-Earth
asteroids, etc. The superb images from the LSST will also chart
billions of remote galaxies in 4-D: their gravitationally lensed
images provide a probe of the mysterious Dark Matter and Dark
Energy. Thirty TB of multi-color images per night will be
transformed into a new view of our four dimensional universe.
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