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ESO: First light for MUSE
Powerful 3D spectrograph successfully installed on VLT

A new innovative instrument called MUSE (Multi Unit Spectroscopic Explorer) has been successfully installed on ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) at the Paranal Observatory in northern Chile. MUSE has observed distant galaxies, bright stars and other test targets during the first period of very successful observations. ...

MUSE’s science goals include delving into the early epochs of the Universe to probe the mechanisms of galaxy formation and studying both the motions of material in nearby galaxies and their chemical properties. It will have many other applications, ranging all the way from studies of the planets and satellites in the Solar System, through the properties of star-forming regions in the Milky Way and out to the distant Universe.

As a unique and powerful tool for discovery MUSE uses 24 spectrographs to separate light into

its component colours to create both images and spectra of selected regions of the sky. It creates 3D views of the Universe with a spectrum for each pixel as the third dimension [1]. During the subsequent analysis the astronomer can move through the data and study different views of the object at different wavelengths, just like tuning a television to different channels at different frequencies. ...

Read more at:

http://www.eso.org/public/news/eso1407/