Subaru Telescope 2.0

Key Instruments > Hyper Suprime-Cam (HSC)

Hyper Suprime-Cam (HSC)

Hyper Suprime-Cam (HSC)

Hyper Suprime-Cam (HSC) saw the first light in 2013 and started to serve for open-use observations in 2014. It offers an ultra-wide field of view equivalent to nine full Moons in the optical wavelength (0.38-1.1 micrometers). The total pixel number is more than 87 million, with 116 highly sensitive CCDs. HSC captures astronomical images with a spatial resolution as high as 0.4 arcseconds over the entire field of view when observing conditions are excellent.

Over a period of 330 nights between 2014-2021, the extensive observing program “Hyper Suprime-Cam Subaru Strategic Program (HSC-SSP)” was conducted. This program has yielded scientific results that can be achieved thanks to the unique capability of Subaru + HSC, including the widest map of dark matter distribution with high spatial resolution. As of June 2022, the first, second, and third datasets were released to the public. HSC is also available for open use and has produced many scientific results, including identifying an optical counterpart of a gravitational wave event.

HSC is a unique wide-field camera mounted on a large telescope in the northern hemisphere and will keep leading astronomy research.

HSC was developed in international collaboration with research institutes, including Kavli IPMU, Academia Sinica Institute of Astronomy and Astrophysics (ASIAA), and Princeton University.

Keywords

HSC has an ultra-wide field equivalent to nine full Moons (1.7 square degrees).

The HSC-SSP datasets are released to the public.