Gaia, ready to characterize one billion stars [NOT TRANSLATED]

Next December 19th, 2013 at 10.12 am (CET) is scheduled for the launch of Gaia from space base in Kourou (Guiana Frnacesa).

Gaia, the ESA satellite in which have collaborated the UB-ICC/IEEC with a prominent role, will collect data from one billion stars to build a 3D map of the Milky Way, which represent 1% of the total galaxy. The mission will last five years.

The main scientific objective of the Gaia mission is to decipher the history of the Milky Way, from its origins to the present state, within the study of the positions, distances and motions of stars and the determination of their age and chemical composition.

One of the complicated issues of the mission is the collection and management of data, with a final cumulative quantity of a petabyte. This database will be made public and may make a scientific exploitation.

The success of the project has been possible thanks to the collaboration between the University and several Spanish companies, representing a state of 11% (higher than the Spanish representation in the ESA, 8%).

According to Jordi Torra, UB professor (ICCUB-IEEC), ‘Gaia is a mission that can change the astrophysics in the coming decades’, because the satellite is a technological and scientific challenge.

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Astrium [NOT TRANSLATED]