Europe’s New Space Telescope Euclid Sends Its First Photos to Earth

The Euclid (Euclidean) space telescope, launched by the European Space Agency on July 1, 2023, delivered its first photos of looking into the depths of space while it was still in its first month. In the photograph, countless galaxies and stars were posing to Earth together.

The photos from the satellite also gave scientists some relief. The two cameras on the spacecraft, VIS and NISP, have been confirmed to be working smoothly. But these images are just the beginning.

First images from the Euclid telescope:

• Image captured with VIS.

• Image taken with NISP.

Euclid has a 1.2-metre-wide mirror, half the size of the Hubble Space Telescope’s mirror. But just because this mirror is small doesn’t mean Euclid will be “worse” than Hubble or other telescopes.

Instead of looking at galaxies and stars like Euclid, Hubble and James Webb one by one, he is responsible for taking a distant look at the observable universe. The spacecraft will specifically look for tangible traces of dark matter, one of the universe’s greatest mysteries.

The vehicle will reach the main observation point after traveling another 1.5 million kilometers and will try to image 36% of the observable universe during its 6-year mission.