Private companies are expanding their role in space, and Schmidt Sciences is developing Lazuli, a space telescope intended to study exoplanets that have been difficult to examine in depth. The company hopes to launch the telescope in 2028 or 2029, although no final date has been set.
Lazuli will have a 3-meter primary mirror, larger than Hubble’s, and will observe from visible light through the near-infrared in 23 colors. Its spectrograph will help researchers determine the composition of celestial objects by analyzing the light they emit or reflect.
The telescope’s main instrument is the ExtraSolar Coronagraph, designed to block the glare of distant stars so that the much fainter light reflected by orbiting planets can be studied. This capability could help Lazuli investigate cold gas giants, which are harder to detect than hot Jupiters because they orbit farther from their stars.
A study by researchers from the University of Michigan and the University of Arizona identifies 27 giant exoplanets as potential targets for Lazuli. The study has not yet been peer-reviewed, and the planets are candidates rather than confirmed targets.
Lazuli is also expected to work alongside other Schmidt Sciences projects: the ground-based optical arrays Argus and LFAST, and the Deep Synoptic Array radio telescope. The instruments are set to share software and data, allowing observations from one to guide follow-up work with another. The study also notes that public facilities, including the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope and the Very Large Telescope, could observe some of the same candidates and share data with private projects.
Sources: Xataka.