NASA's Super Pressure Balloon Imaging Telescope (SuperBIT) has successfully launched on a scientific balloon from New Zealand, capturing its first research images of the Tarantula Nebula and Antennae Galaxies.
SuperBIT: Balloon-Borne Telescope Offers Cost-Effective Alternative to Space Telescopes
The Super Pressure Balloon Imaging Telescope (SuperBIT) successfully launched on a scientific super pressure balloon from Wānaka, New Zealand, on April 16, 2023. At 108,000 feet above Earth’s surface, the balloon-borne telescope captured its first research images of the Tarantula Nebula and Antennae Galaxies, offering scientists a near-space platform to view these celestial targets.
Balloon-Based Telescopes: A Lower-Cost Option with a Global Reach
Balloon-based telescopes have a significant advantage over space telescopes in terms of cost, as they don’t require expensive rocket launches. Super pressure balloons can circumnavigate the globe for up to 100 days, gathering valuable scientific data. Floating above most of Earth’s atmosphere, these balloons are suitable for many astronomical observations.
SuperBIT: Mapping Dark Matter and Observing the Cosmos
The SuperBIT telescope captures images of galaxies in the visible-to-near ultraviolet light spectrum, similar to the Hubble Space Telescope’s capabilities but with a wider field of view. The mission’s goal is to map dark matter around galaxy clusters by measuring the weak gravitational lensing caused by these massive objects.
The Tarantula Nebula, a large star-forming region of ionized hydrogen gas, lies 161,000 light-years from Earth in the Large Magellanic Cloud. Its turbulent clouds of gas and dust swirl between the region’s bright, newly formed stars. The nebula has previously been observed by both the Hubble Space Telescope and James Webb Space Telescope.
The Antennae galaxies, cataloged as NGC 4038 and NGC 4039, are two large galaxies colliding 60 million light-years away in the constellation Corvus. Previously captured by the Hubble Space Telescope, Chandra X-ray Observatory, and the now-retired Spitzer Space Telescope, a composite image of these galaxies combines data from all three telescopes.
Durham University released the first research images from SuperBIT’s flight. The SuperBIT team is a collaboration among NASA, Durham University (UK), the University of Toronto (Canada), and Princeton University (New Jersey).
