The Giant Magellan Telescope (GMT), an enormous ground-based telescope currently under construction in Chile’s Atacama Desert, is one vital step closer toward completion.
Earlier this month, the National Science Foundation (NSF) confirmed the massive observatory will advance to its Major Facilities Design Phase, one of the final steps before becoming eligible for federal construction funding. Announced in December, Northwestern University is a founding partner of the GMT. Now, this critical milestone affirms the GMT’s scientific merit, construction progress and alignment with U.S. priorities in science and technology.
“This milestone reflects not just national recognition, but a shared global commitment to advancing discovery,” said Northwestern’s Vicky Kalogera, a key scientific leader of Northwestern’s GMT initiative. “With this visionary facility, Northwestern researchers will be at the forefront of unlocking the universe’s deepest mysteries.”
Kalogera is the Daniel I. Linzer Distinguished Professor of Physics and Astronomy at Northwestern’s Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences. She also is director of the Center for Interdisciplinary Exploration and Research in Astrophysics (CIERA) and the NSF-Simons Foundation AI Institute for the Sky (SkAI, pronounced “sky”).
Launching in the 2030s, GMT will be the world’s most powerful optical telescope. By producing images 10 times clearer than the Hubble Space Telescope, GMT will explore the distant universe, including the search for signs of life. Unique among the new class of “extremely large telescopes,” GMT will feature the widest field of view with adaptive optics to correct for blur caused by Earth’s atmosphere.
As a partner, Northwestern will contribute its expertise in astrophysics, artificial intelligence (AI) and engineering. Specifically, Northwestern scientists will develop and apply AI tools to enhance GMT’s abilities to search for Earth-like planets across the Milky Way, probe the universe’s most energetic explosions and explore the relationship between galaxies and black holes.
Read the full story by Amanda Morris in Northwestern Now.