China owns world’s last giant single-dish telescope: 500 meters FAST

• China’s Spherical Aperture Radio Telescope (FAST) is the largest and last giant single-dish telescope after the Arecibo collapse.
• As China’s lunar mission advances, experts say, with its resolution and sensitivity, the FAST telescope will help produce critical research over the next several decades.
• Opened in 2016, in November, Chinese state media reported that FAST could host foreign scientists in 2021.
• Visit the Business Insider homepage for more stories.

After the tragedy that struck the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico on Wednesday, the scientific community mourned the loss of an astronomical monument.

There is only one giant satellite dish radio telescope that is unique in the world: China’s 500-meter-aperture spherical radio telescope (FAST).

Completed in 2016 and located in southwest China’s Guizhou Province, the observatory cost $ 171 million and took around half a decade to build. Its large size allows it to detect weak radio waves from pulsars and materials in distant galaxies; 300 of its 500 meters in diameter can be used at any time.

Experts say that over the next decade, FAST should shine in terms of studying the origins of supermassive black holes or identifying weak radio waves to understand the characteristics of planets outside the solar system.

In November, Chinese state media reported that in 2021, the FAST facility would become accessible to foreign scientists.

The Chinese Academy of Sciences’ National Astronomical Observatory, which oversees FAST, did not immediately respond to the comments.

NAIC Arecibo / NSF Observatory, Ricardo Arduengo / AFP / Getty Images

There were some functions the Arecibo telescope could do that FAST couldn’t, however.

“For observation within the solar system, Arecibo was able to transmit signals and receive their reflections from the planets, a function that FAST cannot accomplish on its own. This function has enabled Arecibo to facilitate the monitoring of near-Earth asteroids, which is important in the defense of the Earth against space threats, ”said Liu Boyang, researcher in radio astronomy at the International Center for Research in Radio Astronomy of the ‘University of Western Australia, to the South China Morning Post.

As Business Insider reported earlier this week, China has made significant strides in the space race as the United States has suffered a setback.

China’s Chang’e-5 probe landed on the moon this week, collected lunar samples, and the samples returned to its orbiter, which will begin the process of a weeks-long trip to Earth to deliver the samples. Today, Chinese state media and NASA shared images of China planting its flag on the moon.