ESA’s Planck satellite at Copenhagen’s Planetarium

The Tycho Brahe Planetarium in Copenhagen hosts from today a full-scale mock-up of ESA’s
satellite Planck, as the main element of an exhibition officially opened today by the Danish Minister of Research, Birte Weiss.

Planck is an ESA scientific mission to study the origin and evolution of the Universe, due to be launched in 2007. The Danish Space Research Institute (DSRI) has been deeply involved in the mission from the beginning and is currently building the Planck telescope mirror system.

The Planck mock-up, made of wood and aluminium, is about 5 metres high and 4.5 metres wide. Originally built for technical purposes, it has been painted according to a colour-code that differentiates the main parts of the satellite: a 1.5 metre telescope, the detectors and the ‘service module’.

Apart from this model, the Planck Exhibition at the Tycho Brahe Planetarium will include a poster exhibition and other items related to research in cosmology. It will be open until mid-July.

“Exhibiting Planck at the Tycho Brahe Planetarium will give the Danish public a great opportunity to learn about Planck and the Danish involvement in this exciting mission aiming at the ultimate frontier of cosmology” said Director of the Planetarium BjØrn Franck JØrgensen.

Hans Ulrik NØrgaard-Nielsen, from DSRI and one of the three Planck principal investigators, highlighted Planck’s “unique scientific capabilities to study formation of structures in the early Universe. With the ESA/DSRI agreement concerning the delivery of the Planck mirror system in hand, we have assured Danish astronomers access to the full Planck database”.

Also present at the opening event this morning were Professor Igor Novikov, from the Theoretical Astrophysics Centre (Copenhagen); and ESA’s Planck Project Ccientist Jan Tauber.

Contacts:

-For information about the “Planck Exhibition”:
Michael J.D. Linden-VØrnle, Tycho Brahe Planetarium
Tel: (+45) 33 18 19 97
E-mail: Mykal@tycho.dk


-For information about Planck:
Jan Tauber, Planck project scientist:
Tel: +31 71 565 5342
e-mail: jtauber@estec.esa.nl