The Chinese Academy of Sciences announced on Nov. 27 that the world’s largest steerable radio telescope is now under construction in northeast China’s Jilin Province.
Located in Huadian, Jilin, the radio telescope, at 120 meters in diameter, will help scientists in understanding planets and asteroids more accurately. What is special about the new telescope, is that it can send electromagnetic waves to celestial bodies, and receive the return waves to measure the distances between the planets and the Earth accurately. This new telescope will surpass the next-largest radio telescope, the Green Bank Observatory, which measures 100 meters in diameter, and is located in Green Bank, West Virginia.
A steerable radio telescope allows astronomers to observe any part of the sky by precisely directing the dish towards the target object, providing access to a much wider range of celestial sources, compared to a fixed radio telescope. This enables the study of objects that may not be visible in the same position every night, and is crucial for detailed observation and tracking of astronomical phenomena across the sky.Luo Xuejiu, head of the project office for the radio telescope, said that the site for the facility was chosen in May; the pile foundation work has been completed, and the installation, adjustments and testing are expected to be completed in 2028. China has already set the record for the largest single-dish fixed telescope, the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical radio Telescope (FAST), which is located in the southwestern province of Guizhou.
For further reading on radio astronomy, please visit EIR February 8, 2019, Vol. 46 No. 6; “Radio Astronomy: Peeking Into the Infinite.”
