South Africa makes giant strides in radio telescope
MeerKAT antenna Carnarvon, South Africa, March 27, GNA - South Africa has made a giant stride into radio telescope giving birth to the first of 64 antennas - MeerKAT- a precursor to the Square
Kilometre Array (SKA) telescope project, which scientists anticipate will redefine astronomy in the 21st century.
The scale of the SKA represents a huge leap forward in both the engineering, research and development of radio telescopes, and will deliver a transformational increase in science capability when completed.
Mr Derek Hanekom, South Africa's Minister of Science and Technology said "The launch of the first MeerKAT antenna signifies South Africa's ardent commitment to the MeerKAT project and the broader SKA project. It further typifies the excellent engineering and technical capabilities in South Africa that have enabled us to deliver a project of this magnitude within projected timeframes and budget allocations."
He adds that the launch of the MeerKAT Karoo Array processor building and the associated design and development activities undertaken marked South Africa's readiness to embark on a big data programme at national and international levels.
Mr Hanekom said the SKA project will perfectly augment, complement and lead the way in scientific discovery.
"At least 75 percent of the components making up the MeerKAT antennas will be manufactured in South Africa, but several industries in SKA Organisation partner countries around the world are also making crucial contributions. The global technology collaborations bring cutting-edge know-how and many years of antenna experience to the MeerKAT project, the minister added.
"The SKA project will be a state-of-the-art technology and a physics machine for the 21st Century as it will facilitate probe into gravity and cosmic magnetism as well as transform understanding of more normal astronomy," Dr Phil Diamond, Director-General of SKA Organisation said.
He said the global nature and collaboration has brought some inherent challenges including communication, transparency and having to deal with different governments in the partnership but are being surmounted.
"The future of radio astronomy is spectacular," Dr Diamond states in an interview with the Ghana News Agency.
"With the so-called 'Offset Gregorian' design there are no struts in the way to block or scatter incoming electromagnetic signals," MeerKAT Project Manager Willem Esterhuyse explains.
He said "This means that the instrument will be more sensitive than a more conventional symmetric design, and will deliver excellent imaging quality."
"This is a good example of maximizing local content, while also drawing on international expertise," Esterhuyse says.
Dignitaries from around the world, representatives from SKA Organisation member countries namely Australia, Canada, China, Germany, Italy, New Zealand, South Africa, Sweden, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom and India an Associate Member as well as Ministers from African partner countries, preciesely, Ghana, Botswana, Kenya,
Madagascar, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia and Zambia and other major actors have witnessed the lauch at the Radio Astronomy Reserve in Karoo.
Standing 19.5 m tall and weighing 42 tons, the new MeerKAT antenna towers above the antennas of the nearby KAT-7 instrument. KAT-7 was completed in 2010 as an engineering prototype for MeerKAT, and is now routinely used for scientific research.
Dr Jasper Horrell, General Manager for Science Computing and Innovation at SKA SA explains "Once up and running, the MeerKAT will generate enough data from the antennas to fill about four and a half million standard 4.7 GB DVDs in a day."
"However, much of this data is processed on-the-fly and the archive will initially be sized at the equivalent of about 2 million DVDs, retaining some of the larger volume, less processed data for shorter periods and only retaining the smaller volume, more processed science data products indefinitely."
All of the on-site infrastructure (buildings, roads, electrical power conditioning and reticulation, aircraft landing strip, etc) has been constructed by South African companies, and the SKA SA infrastructure team based in Johannesburg manages the complex project.
SKA SA engineers and contracted manufacturing companies will now continue to produce the massive, high-precision components of the remaining MeerKAT antennas, and install the antennas in the Karoo, according to a tight timeline.
By the end of 2014, the first four receptors will be standing in the Karoo. All 64 receptors will be installed by the end of 2016, with final commissioning being completed in 2017.
"NRC Herzberg congratulates the South African SKA team upon achieving this major milestone today. We are honoured to contribute to this marvelous instrument and very much look forward to the exciting science ahead with MeerKAT and the SKA," Dr Gregory Fahlman, General Manager, the National Research Council of canada (NRC) Herzberg, Programs in Astronomy and Astrophysics, and SKA Canada Board member, says.
MeerKAT will also participate in global VLBI (very long baseline interferometry) operations with all major VLBI networks around the world operating at the MeerKAT frequencies, and add considerably to the sensitivity of the global VLBI networks.
Deploying thousands of radio telescopes, in three unique configurations, it will enable astronomers to monitor the sky in unprecedented detail and survey the entire sky thousands of times faster than any system currently in existence. The SKA telescope will be co-located in Africa and in Australia.
The SKA telescope will have an unprecedented scope in observations, exceeding the image resolution quality of the Hubble Space Telescope of NASA by a factor of 50 times sensitive, and up to 10,000 faster (in terms of its survey speed) whilst also having the ability to image huge areas of sky simultaneously, according to the experts.
SKA South Africa, has unearthed an overwhleming human resource base into astronomy at all levels within a short timeframe.
GNA