A Huge New Gaia Data Release: More Stars, Gravitational Lenses and Asteroids

The ESA's Gaia observatory expanded its targets to include the tightly-packed center of Omega Centauri, an ancient globular cluster. Image Credit: ESA/Gaia/DPAC, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO. Acknowedgements: Michele Trabucchi, Nami Mowlavi and Thomas Lebzelter

The ESA’s Gaia mission is releasing a new tranche of astronomical data. The mission has released three regular, massive hauls of data since it launched in 2013, named Gaia DR1, DR2, and DR3. The ESA is calling this one a ‘focused product release,’ and while it’s smaller than the previous three releases, it’s still impactful.

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