IT IS the daddy of digital cameras. At an amazing 1.5 gigapixels, the image sensor on the European Space Agency鈥檚 galaxy-mapping Gaia satellite, due for launch in 2011, will have the picture-sensing area of more than 500 of today鈥檚 6-megapixel digital cameras.
On 10 June, e2v Technologies of Chelmsford, Essex, UK, got the go-ahead from ESA to begin making 170 microchip image sensors that, when placed together on an ultra-flat silicon carbide surface, will provide Gaia鈥檚 imaging oomph. ESA chose e2v鈥檚 chips because they are made using a proprietary 鈥渂ackthinning鈥� process that reduces the amount of silicon on the sensor, and so cuts down electronic noise in the image.
Gaia will spend five years mapping in unprecedented detail the 3D structure of the universe, including up to a billion stars.
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