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Astronomers using CSIRO’s Australian Square Kilometer Array Pathfinder (ASKAP) have mapped approximately 3,000,000 galaxies in the observable universe.
ASKAP conducted its first survey of the entire southern sky with record speed and detail, creating a new atlas of the Universe. Image credit: CSIRO.
The ASKAP radio telescope was designed to be a sensing tool capable of rapidly observing the entire accessible sky.
It is located at the Murchison Radio-astronomy Observatory (MRO) in Western Australia and is operated by the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO).
ASKAP is an array of 36 12m primary focus antennas. Each is equipped with a phased array feed that allows for the simultaneous digital formation of 36 dual-polarized beams.
“ASKAP is applying the latest in science and technology to age-old questions about the mysteries of the Universe and is providing astronomers around the world with new discoveries to solve their challenges,” said Dr. Larry Marshall, CEO of CSIRO.
“It’s all enabled by innovative CSIRO-developed receivers that feature phased array power technology, which sees ASKAP generate more raw data at a faster rate than all of Australia’s Internet traffic.”
Using the ASKAP telescope, CSIRO astronomer David McConnell and his colleagues from the Rapid ASKAP Continuum Survey (RACS) observed 83% of the entire sky.
Their result shows that a full-sky survey can be done in weeks rather than years, opening up new opportunities for discovery.
The new data will allow astronomers to undertake statistical analyzes of large populations of galaxies, in the same way that social researchers use information from a national census.
“This census of the Universe will be used by astronomers around the world to explore the unknown and study everything from star formation to how galaxies and their supermassive black holes evolve and interact,” said Dr. McConnell. .
With ASKAP’s advanced receivers, the RACS team only needed to combine 903 images to form the complete sky map, significantly fewer than the tens of thousands of images required for previous all-sky radio surveys conducted by the world’s leading telescopes.
The 13.5 exabytes of raw data generated by the radio telescope was processed using custom hardware and software from CSIRO.
The final 903 images and supporting information amount to 26 terabytes of data.
“We expect to find tens of millions of new galaxies in future investigations,” said Dr. McConnell.
The team’s findings were published in Publications of the Astronomical Society of Australia.
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D. McConnell et al. 2020. The Rapid ASKAP Continuum Survey I: Design and first results. Publications of the Astronomical Society of Australia 37: e048; doi: 10.1017 / pasa.2020.41
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