Alma Telescope
Situation right now:
- According to a recent report in the journal Science, the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), a radio telescope with 66 antennas in the Atacama Desert of northern Chile, is about to receive hardware and software upgrades that will enable it to collect much more data and produce sharper images than ever before.
- The most significant ALMA modernization will be the replacement of the correlator, a supercomputer that combines data from numerous antennas to create extremely detailed images of celestial objects.
- The Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array is known by the abbreviation ALMA.
- In order to examine celestial objects at millimetre and submillimeter wavelengths, a state-of-the-art telescope named ALMA is used. They can see through dust clouds, which helps astronomers examine distant, faint galaxies and stars. It can also detect radio signals that are exceedingly faint thanks to its extraordinary sensitivity.
- The 66 extremely precise antennas on the telescope are spread out over a space of up to 16 kilometres.
- There are several receivers attached to each antenna, and each one is set to a certain band of electromagnetic spectrum wavelengths.
- The antennas may be adjusted for different perspectives by moving them closer together or farther apart, much like a zoom lens on a camera. According to a report from Science Node, the outcome is amazing, never-before-seen footage of the deepest, darkest space. A separate image is produced from each antenna by the correlator.
- The radio telescope was designed, orchestrated, and constructed by the National Radio Astronomy Observatory of the United States (NRAO), the European Southern Observatory (ESO), and the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (NAOJ). It has been fully operational since 2013. (ESO). Astronomers have used it to make significant discoveries over time, including those about starburst galaxies and the generation of dust inside supernova 1987A.
Why is ALMA located in Chile’s Atacama Desert?
- Because the millimetre and submillimeter wavelengths it studies are extremely susceptible to atmospheric water vapour absorption on Earth, ALMA is situated on the Chajnantor plateau in Chile’s Atacama Desert at an elevation of 16,570 feet (5,050 metres) above sea level.
- The desert is also the driest spot on Earth, which makes it an excellent location for astronomical observation because most of its nights are cloud- and moisture-free.
- The flight from Japan to the ALMA facility in Chile takes 40 hours, connections included. Despite being so far away, the chosen location still offers the greatest ALMA telescope viewing conditions on Earth.
What are some of ALMA’s most important findings?
- With ALMA’s ability to take high-resolution pictures of the gas and dust from which stars and planets are created as well as elements that could be the basis for life, scientists are seeking to find answers to long-standing riddles regarding our cosmic origins.
- The discovery that starburst galaxies formed earlier in the history of the universe than previously thought was one of the first ones discovered in 2013. According to the study, these recently discovered galaxies “represent the active, star-forming youth of today’s most massive galaxies.”
- By producing detailed images of the protoplanetary disc encircling HL Tauri, a very young T Tauri star in the constellation Taurus, some 450 light years from Earth, ALMA “changed the previously accepted theory on the planetary formation,” according to N.
- In 2015, using the telescope, a phenomena known as the Einstein ring, which occurs when light from a galaxy or star passes by a massive object on its route to the Earth, was seen in extraordinarily fine detail.
- The Event Horizon Telescope project, a large telescope array made up of a global network of radio telescopes, just caught the first image of the supermassive black hole at the centre of our own Milky Way galaxy. Scientists unveiled the image in May 2022.
