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Updated: December 4, 2020 10:51:20
The Australian Square Kilometer Array Pathfinder (ASKAP) is developed and maintained by the Australian National Science Agency, CSIRO. (Source: csiro.au)
The Australian Square Kilometer Array Pathfinder (ASKAP), a powerful telescope developed and operated by the country’s CSIRO science agency, mapped over three million galaxies in a record 300 hours during its first full-sky survey. The first results of this survey were published in the journal Publications of the Astronomical Society of Australia November 30th.
What is ASKAP?
ASKAP is a telescope designed over a decade ago and located about 800km north of Perth. It became fully operational in February 2019 and is currently conducting pilot sky surveys before it can begin large-scale projects from 2021 onwards.
ASKAP investigations are designed to map the structure and evolution of the Universe, which it does by observing galaxies and the hydrogen gas they contain.
One of its most important features is its wide field of view, thanks to which it was able to take panoramic photos of the sky in great detail. The telescope uses a new technology developed by CSIRO, which is a sort of “radio camera” to achieve high detection speeds and is composed of 36 parabolic antennas, each with a diameter of 12 m.
Using this telescope at CSIRO’s Murchison Radio-astronomy Observatory (MRO) in the Australian outback, the research team was able to observe more than 83% of the sky visible from the ASKAP site in Western Australia. For the current survey, he combined over 903 images to form the complete sky map.
In essence, the telescope was able to map a large area of the universe, something that would otherwise take nearly a decade.📣 Follow Express Explained on Telegram
What is the significance of the results?
The current Rapid ASKAP Continuum Survey (RACS) taken by the ASKAP telescope is like a “Google map” of the Universe where most of the millions of star-like points are distant galaxies, about a million of which have not been seen before. . Mapping the Universe on that scale allows astronomers to study star formation and how galaxies and their supermassive black holes evolve and interact with each other.
Significantly, the images that the telescope took are on average deeper and have better spatial resolution than those taken during other sky surveys. The purpose of the RACS survey is to generate images that will aid future investigations undertaken using the telescope.
In addition, the results of various investigations conducted using ASKAP are also used for the development of the Square Kilometer Array (SKA), an international project aiming to build the largest radio telescopes in the world.
ASKAP is a telescope designed over a decade ago and located about 800km north of Perth. (Source: csiro.au)
The results of this survey are significant for two main reasons. First, the time it takes ASKAP to map the Universe shows that it doesn’t have to take years, and second, the data collected as a result of the investigation will help astronomers undertake statistical analyzes of large populations of galaxies.
“Today is a special day for astronomy as we publish the results of the first southern sky survey by our ASKAP telescope. What used to take years can now be done in days by revealing more of the Universe – about a million times more! “CSIRO said on Twitter.
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