Beginning of the ultra-sensitive radio telescope in South Africa



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The researchers produced a panorama of the center of the Milky Way galaxy (which contains a supermassive black hole) using radio, infrared and X-ray wavelengths that penetrate gas and dust counteracting conventional telescopes. . The image is not just pretty – it shows a lot of sources of magnetized filament structures near the black hole that remained until then a mystery, potentially offering an explanation of how these filaments appeared .

There are already two ongoing projects making use of the full telescope. We will study the level of hydrogen in galaxies, which could help fill the history of the universe, while the other will attack fast gusts and other transient bursts which remain elusive for astronomers. In the end, MeerKAT will host eight major study projects that will give each team more than 1000 hours of observation time over five years.

The work to replicate MeerKAT in the Square Kilometer Array will not begin until 2020, when it will gradually integrate. 130 other dishes in South Africa as well as up to 130,000 antennas in Australia. When it is ready, however, the SKA could give a glimpse that other telescopes could not match. This is also a milestone for space science in Africa. Although MeerKat is expensive at around 4.4 billion rand (US $ 331 billion), it is already used to attract scientists who would otherwise have to travel to America, Australia or Europe to collect the data they have need.

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