A project to build a pioneering telescope in Chile got a $30 million boost Thursday with donations from Microsoft chairman Bill Gates and former company executive Charles Simonyi.

Simonyi is donating $20 million and Gates $10 million to pay for three major mirrors that will be used in the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope, a nearly $400 million project that will be able to survey the entire sky every three nights — something never done before.

Astronomers anticipate surveying the heavens

for 10 years, with observations starting in 2015.

“People can find out what’s going on everywhere in the sky, and no one has ever done that before — not even come close,” said Donald Sweeney, manager of the LSST Project, a partnership headquartered in Tucson and split among 23 universities, national laboratories and private entities.

The telescope is to be built on 9,000-foot Cerro Pachon in northern Chile. It will take an […]

Orginal post by Top Tech News