The next step is to apply it to images from the Vera C Rubin Observatory when it begins science operations later this year. The atmosphere distorts light as the result of tiny but ever-present fluctuations in temperature, pressure, the amount of airborne dust and so on. So far, the ImageMM algorithm has been tested on the Subaru telescope, returning images sharper and more detailed than what was previously possible with the Japanese-owned observatory. Although space telescopes will still produce better images, they tend to have narrow fields of view, whereas Rubin has a much wider field of view of 3.5 degrees, or about the angular diameter of seven full moons . "We'll never have ground truth, but we think this is as close as it currently gets to perfect [for ground-based telescopes]," said Sukurdeep.