One of the 21st century’s most ambitious scientific projects has begun a quest to view the “Cosmic Dawn” — the formation of the universe’s first large galaxies.
The project is a collaboration between 15 nations, including Taiwan, the US, Japan, Chile and Canada.
Astronomers from the participating member states can now work together in Chile and make use of the most complex telescope ever built — the Atacama Large Milllimetre/submillimetre Array (ALMA), according to a report by the BBC.
According to the Guardian newspaper, after more than two decades of design and construction, ALMA is ready for use by astronomers around the world.
The observatory’s purpose is to study the processes that occurred a few hundred million years after the formation of the universe; when the first stars began to shine. The telescope will help explain the current look of the cosmos.
One of ALMA’s scientific operations astronomers, Diego Garcia, was quoted by the BBC as saying the launch of the giant telescope marks the beginning of a “new golden age of astronomy.”
“We are going to be able to see the beginning of the universe; how the first galaxies were formed. We are going to learn so much more about how the universe works,” he told the BBC.
ALMA, located on the highest plateau in the Atacama desert and close to Chile’s border with Bolivia, consists of an array of giant antennas linked together.
The observatory has been under construction since 2003. With new antennas added to the observatory, astronomers can now observe the formation of stars with more precision than ever before.
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