During the month of July, Matthew Leach, a senior mechanical engineering student, and Alice Pisani, assistant professor of physics and a member of the Euclid Consortium, attended the launch of the Euclid satellite at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

Crafted by the European Space Agency, the space telescope is poised to capture data from over a third of the extragalactic expanse in the next six years, ushering in the most precise three-dimensional celestial map ever created. Scientists intend to harness Euclid's map to delve into the profound mysteries of dark matter and dark energy, enigmatic entities that constitute a staggering 95 percent of our universe. Their exploration aims to unveil the profound impact of these forces on our observations as we gaze into the depths of space and time.

“The Euclid project seems like a very unifying experience in physics, not only among the different fields of physics but between engineering and the space sciences as well," says Matthew Leach ME’24. "Each contributor was another professor at another university in another corner of the world. Someone put up the Italian flag on one of the bleachers and I sat next to a photographer from South America, who lived in Orlando. I hope there will be opportunities for me to contribute to the next big unifying projects in the future!”