We’ve seen a few smaller pictures from the impressive Planck microwave array, but today the ESA is releasing the first all-sky survey imagery showing the entire sky.

The mottled structure of the CMBR, with its tiny temperature fluctuations reflecting the primordial density variations from which today’s cosmic structure originated, is clearly visible in the high-latitude regions of the map. The central band is the plane of our Galaxy. A large portion of the image is dominated by the diffuse emission from its gas and dust. The image was derived from data collected by Planck during its first all-sky survey and comes from observations taken between August 2009 and June 2010. This image is a low- resolution version of the full data set.

via ESA – Planck – Planck unveils the Universe – now and then – images.