With a groundbreaking “lobster eye,” a new space observatory is scheduled to launch in January 2024. It will search the cosmos for X-ray bursts, which are produced by some of the universe’s most potent occurrences, such as exploding stars, colliding neutron stars, and feeding black holes.

The European Space Agency (ESA), the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics (MPE), and the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) collaborated to name the Einstein Probe, which bears Albert Einstein’s name.

With its extraordinarily wide range of view and next-generation X-ray equipment, this spacecraft will enable scientists to not only identify new phenomena but also thoroughly examine them.
“Our only laboratory to study the most energetic processes is the universe,” stated Erik Kuulkers, the project scientist for ESA’s Einstein Probe, in a release. “Missions like Einstein Probe are essential to advance our understanding of these processes and to learn more about fundamental aspects of high-energy physics.”

identifying the most violent cosmic occurrences

When the cores of dying stars collapse, dramatic and violent events like supernovas release X-rays into the atmosphere. They are intimately related to both the shredding of stellar material before to its consumption by black holes and the collisions of neutron stars, which are extremely dense, already-dead stars.

However, the X-ray light that these intense cosmic events emit can be quite unpredictable and changeable because they are frequently brief. This light can appear, disappear, brighten, and dull very quickly. It frequently appears in the sky for a split second before disappearing for extended periods of time, if it reappear at all.
Scientists are very interested in finding these X-rays because the high intensity light has information about the source that produced it stored in it. This implies that the Einstein Probe’s X-ray observations could aid scientists in understanding these occurrences and also allow astronomers to identify novel X-ray sources.

Since gravitational waves and X-rays are released by neutron star collisions, which Einstein first predicted in his general theory of relativity in 1915, the Einstein Probe may be able to assist gravitational wave detectors in locating the source of these minute ripples in space-time that have traveled millions or even billions of light years.

In the end, this might make it easier for scientists to see these collisions before they disappear, providing additional insight into the dynamics of these collisions and the peculiar physics that surround them. For example, it is known that heavy metals like gold are produced after neutron star collisions.

A “lobster eye”—why?

The Wide-field X-ray Telescope (WXT) and the extremely sensitive Follow-up X-ray Telescope (FXT) are two ground-breaking instruments that the Einstein Probe is outfitted with in order to attain its groundbreaking perspective of the cosmos.

The WXT’s distinctive modular design, which is modeled by a lobster’s eye, gives it an enlarged perspective of the universe. Lobsters have an amazing 180-degree field of vision because their eyes have evolved to see light by reflection rather than refraction, unlike the eyes of other animals.

WXT’s “Micro Pore Optics technology” enables the Einstein Probe to capture 3,600 square degrees in a single image, or 10% of the Earth’s celestial sphere. This allows it to see almost the whole sky at night over Earth in just three orbits around the planet, which would take the Einstein Probe about ninety-six minutes each.

The FXT instrument on the Einstein Probe will take over after WXT detects an intriguing or novel X-ray producing event. It will target the X-ray source and conduct a much more in-depth analysis of it.
Furthermore, in the event that WXT detects anything of note in the way of X-rays, the Einstein probe will send out a signal to ground-based observatories. This will enable them to train additional telescopes on the source and investigate it in a variety of other light frequencies, from high-energy short-wave gamma-rays to low-energy long-wave radio waves.

This multi-wavelength data may be crucial for carrying out in-depth studies of black hole feeding, neutron star collisions, and supernovae.

“Thanks to its innovative design, Einstein Probe can monitor large swaths of the sky at a glance,” Kuulkers added. “In this way, we can discover many new sources while at the same time studying the behavior of X-ray light coming from known celestial objects over long periods.”