The world's biggest ever digital camera is being tested in an observatory in Chile. The Large Synoptic Survey Telescope camera was made in the USA. It was installed in the Vera C. Rubin Observatory earlier this week. Astronomers will now start testing it. They will observe the southern hemisphere skies over the next decade. A U.S. government department commented on how important the telescope was. It called the imager "a triumph of science and engineering". It added: "We look forward to seeing the unprecedented images this camera will produce."

The camera is the size of a car and weighs 2,721 kg. It has a huge 3-billion-pixel sensor. Today's top-of-the-range smartphone cameras have just 200 million pixels. Astronomers will scan the sky to take time-lapse images. The lead researcher said: "We're going to make a colour movie of the entire Southern Hemisphere sky." He hopes to capture images that will shed light on how galaxies formed. His team will also investigate dark matter – the invisible substance that makes up a significant portion of the universe. In addition, the camera will map our Milky Way galaxy.