A group of South African astronomers announced on Saturday the discovery of more than a thousand galaxies never before known to have been seen or recorded by human beings. The astronomers “were showing off the first taste of the ultimate cosmic feast of what is to come, at least as seen from this particular dusty crumb called Earth,” writes Dennis Overbye at the New York Times:
Left: A patch of sky about as big as the full moon where the MeerKAT telescope discerned the radio glow of about 200 galaxies. Only a few (circled) had been previously observed; Right: A distant galaxy that is being blown up by a black hole at its center. Credit SKA South Africa
When it’s done, sometime around 2030, the Square Kilometer Array, as it is known, will be the largest telescope ever built on our planet. It will consist of thousands of radio antennas that will collectively cover a square kilometer (hence the name), spread out in mathematically intricate patterns in South Africa and Australia.
The telescope is being built by an international collaboration with its headquarters at the University of Manchester in England. The first phase, to be completed in 2023, will cost 650 million euros.
Astronomers estimate that it will pull some 35,000-DVDs-worth of data down from the sky every second. So much that it would take 2 million years to play on your smartphone.
For now the bounty consists of the radio glow of some 1,300 distant galaxies spotted in a patch of sky about 20 times the size of the full moon, where only 70 galaxies had been counted before. Some of them are erupting in cataclysms as massive black holes in their hearts spew radioactive high-energy particles across the dark sea of space.
South African Telescope Spots 1,300 Unknown Galaxies [NYT]
These Frank Chu signs are fake and created with the acme.com/chumaker, but the New York Times headline reminded me of Chu’s intergalactic imaginings.
The MeerKAT radio telescope. Photo: SKA South Africa.
The MeerKAT radio telescope. Photo: SKA South Africa.
The MeerKAT radio telescope. Photo: SKA South Africa.
The MeerKAT radio telescope. Photo: SKA South Africa.
