The European Space Agency's Gaia mission, scheduled
for next year, aims to map the positions, parallaxes and movement
of around a billion objects in the Milky Way. In order to do this,
Esa requires a billion-pixel camera with around 2.5 times the
number of sensors as Nasa's Kepler space telescope. That
camera has been created by UK-based specialist technology company,
E2V has been creating specialist imaging sensors space agencies
including Nasa and Esa since the early 1990s. However, the Gaia
mission represents the first time that E2V has created such
a large number of sensors -- more than 150.
Each of the sensors E2V has made for the Gaia mission has 1,966
pixels by 4,500 pixels and measures 4.7 x 6cm and are thinner
than a human hair.