[ad_1]
When the MeerKAT became operational after ten long years of construction, the violent center of the Milky Way seemed like a natural choice to test the telescope's full capabilities.
– Fernando Camilo, Chief Scientist at the South African Radio Astronomy Observatory (SARAO)
Easier to say than to do. The center of our galaxy is 25,000 light-years away from our pale blue dot, hidden behind the constellation Sagittarius and veiled by swirling storms of gas and interstellar dust. Although both infrared and X-ray are able to penetrate the fog, radio wave lengths have proven to be the most effective (or perhaps the least inefficient) for this purpose.
Nothing could prepare astronomers for what they would discover. The telescope was returning images of a clarity and level of detail so amazing that even the optimists were shocked.
The telescopic representation of the mysterious "filaments" surrounding the supermbadive black hole is particularly impressive – and nowhere else in the galaxy. Scientists still do not know anything about the purpose or the origin of these filaments thirty years after their discovery.
MeerKAT could change all that. According to Farhad Yusef-Zadeh of Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, who had these filamentous structures study the work of his life:
"… it shows so many features never seen before , including compact sources badociated with filaments, that it could provide the key to decipher the code and solve this three-decade enigma. "
The MeerKAT telescope consists of 64 satellite dishes covering a little over 44 feet. (A width equal to the approximate height of your middle brachiosaurus.) These antennas are spaced along a grid and receive different wavelengths of the radio signal, as an overworked computer then translates into images sky radio.
Incredibly, this mbadive telescope This system is one of the facets of a much larger enterprise: the Kilometer Array Square, which will be the largest radio telescope in the world. It is expected that it far exceeds the resolution and image quality of the Hubble Space Telescope – and generates more data than the entire Internet.
What will we do with this knowledge? The era of information has paved the way for data-driven industries – but access to information is of little use if you're not equipped for the ### ## # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # 39; badyze. Scientists are discovering that many breakthroughs are being lost in shake-up, languishing in a manila folder until researchers stumble over them looking for something else.
Perhaps why we continue to seek the heavens:
Source link
