Pan-STARRS Science Mission-1 Underway

Pan-STARRS (Panoramic Survey Telescope And Rapid Response System) is a planned array of four astronomical telescopes and cameras and computing facility that will survey the sky on a continual basis, including accurate astrometry and photometry of detected objects. By detecting any differences from previous observations of the same areas of the sky, it is expected to discover a very large number of new asteroids, comets, variable stars and other celestial objects. Its primary mission is to detect near-Earth objects that threaten to cause impact events. It is expected to create a database of all objects visible from Hawaii (three-quarters of the entire sky) down to apparent magnitude 24.

PS1 going fully operational in mid-June 2010, the Pan-STARRS Project is now focusing on building PS2, and then the full array of four telescopes, sometimes called PS4. Completing the array of four telescopes is estimated at a total cost of US$100 million for the entire array. The PS1 camera alone is expected to uncover 100,000 new asteroids.