The Square Kilometre Array Observatory (SKAO), a new intergovernmental organization dedicated to radio astronomy, recently held its inaugural council meeting. The milestone was marked by the approval for the establishment of the world’s largest radio telescope. This groundbreaking development comes in the wake of the collapse of the influential Arecibo telescope in Puerto Rico last year. Headquartered in the UK, SKAO is an international collaboration involving ten countries, including Australia, Canada, China, India, Italy, New Zealand, South Africa, Sweden, the Netherlands, and the UK.
Understanding Radio Telescopes
A radio telescope is a sophisticated astronomical instrument used to detect radio-frequency radiation from extraterrestrial sources. These sources can include galaxies, stars, and quasars, emitting between wavelengths of about 10 meters and 1 mm. Unlike their optical counterparts, radio telescopes have the unique ability to detect invisible gas, revealing areas of space obscured by cosmic dust. Astronomers have utilised this technology since the 1930s to explore various celestial bodies, with radio astronomy becoming a vital tool for astronomical observations post-World War II.
The Legacy of the Arecibo Telescope
Until its unfortunate collapse in December 2020, the Arecibo telescope in Puerto Rico stood as the world’s second-largest single-dish radio telescope. Constructed in 1963, the telescope’s potent radar facilitated numerous scientific discoveries, including the findings of prebiotic molecules in distant galaxies, the first exoplanets, and the first millisecond pulsar. Today, China’s Sky Eye holds the record as the world’s largest single-dish radio telescope.
Introducing the Square Kilometer Array Telescope
The Square Kilometer Array (SKA) Telescope is set to become the world’s largest radio telescope, with plans for its location in Africa and Australia. The development of SKA will leverage the data collected from various surveys using the Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder (ASKAP), another powerful telescope fully operational since February 2019.
Development and Maintenance of SKA
ASKAP, managed by Australia’s science agency CSIRO, made a record by mapping over three million galaxies within 300 hours during its first all-sky survey last year. Designed to map the structure and evolution of the Universe through galaxy and hydrogen gas observations, ASKAP surverys will inform the development of SKA. SKAO will oversee the operation, maintenance, and construction of SKA.
Cost, Completion, and Significance of SKA
The completion of SKA is expected to take nearly a decade and cost over 1.8 billion pounds. This enormous telescope is set to address key scientific questions about the universe, such as its origins, the birth of the first stars, a galaxy’s life-cycle, the possibility of detecting technologically-active civilizations in our galaxy, and the source of gravitational waves.
Functionality of the SKA Telescope
According to NASA, the telescope will achieve its scientific goals by measuring neutral hydrogen over cosmic time, timing the signals from pulsars in the Milky Way accurately, and detecting millions of galaxies even in high redshifts. With this ambitious project, researchers aim to expand our understanding of the universe significantly.