This illustration shows the three spectra produced simultaneously by the X-shooter instrument on ESO's Very Large Telescope. X-shooter can record the entire spectrum of a celestial object (in this example, a distant lensed quasar) in one shot — from the ultraviolet to the near-infrared — with great sensitivity and spectral resolution. This instrument will be useful for the study of distant exploding objects called gamma-ray bursts, among the most energetic events in the universe, which fade rapidly in brightness in matter of hours after their appearance. The rainbow colors applied to the spectra indicate X-shooter's wide spectral coverage and are meant for illustrative purposes only. The majority of the wavelengths covered are in fact invisible to the human eye.