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P.A. Pinto (Steward Observatory, University of Arizona)
The LSST is an 8.4 meter telescope with a ten square degree field and three gigapixel detector, backed up by a powerful data processing and archiving facility. Operating as a fully-automated survey, it will image the entire sky repeatedly and at a rapid pace, opening the time domain to astronomy by producing more than 20 terabytes of high-quality images per night. Rarely observed events will become commonplace, new and unanticipated events will be discovered, and the combination of LSST with contemporary space-based missions will provide powerful synergies. Adding the data accumulated over years of operation will provide multicolor maps of the entire sky to unprecedented depth, with every pixel tied to its own time history in the database. An "open data" project, it will have no proprietary scientific information or areas of study. The LSST will simultaneously address many of astronomy's fundamental problems, from planetary science to cosmology, and will open a window to new discoveries yet unknown. I will give an overview of the LSST project, the data to be obtained, and some of its principal science drivers and key science deliverables.
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Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, 36 5
© 2004. The American Astronomical Society.