Isophoric News · Tuesday, October 27, 2026
Rubin Observatory releases an engineering test image of the head of the Seagull Nebula
NSF-DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory released an image of the head of the Seagull Nebula, taken in fall 2024 with its engineering test camera, to mark two years since that camera began testing, according to a NOIRLab release reposted by Brookhaven National Laboratory and to Live Science. The camera, called ComCam, has 144 megapixels and covers about twice the area of the full Moon; it took roughly 16,000 exposures between Oct. 24 and Dec. 11, 2024, the release says. The nebula is about 3,700 light-years away, and the pictured region, IC 2177, glows pink from hydrogen lit by young stars, according to the release. Both pages say the image was a test of hardware and software. Live Science adds that the observatory has since moved to a larger camera of 3,200 megapixels with about 20 times the field of view, and that its Legacy Survey of Space and Time has begun, with a plan to photograph the sky for ten years. Brookhaven's note says the Legacy Survey began earlier this year.
