World's biggest radiotelescope launched in Netherlands

Breitbart.com ^ | June 12, 2010 | Breitbart

[Abin Sur]

Scientists in the Netherlands unveiled the largest radiotelescope in the world on Saturday, saying it was capable of detecting faint signals from almost as far back as the Big Bang.

The LOFAR (LOw Frequency ARray) consists of 25,000 small antennas measuring between 50 centimetres and two metres across, instead of a traditional large dish, said Femke Boekhorst of the Netherlands Radioastronomy Institute.

It is based near the northeastern Dutch town of Assen, but the antennas are spread out across the rest of the Netherlands and also in Germany, Sweden, France and Britain.

"Today we have launched the biggest radiotelescope in the world. When you combine all the antennas you get a giant telescope with a diameter of about 1,000 kilometres (600 miles)," Boekhorst told AFP.

"The observations that we will be able to make will allow us to learn more about the origin of the universe, back to the moment right after the Big Bang," she added.

[Abin Sur]

More information: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lofar

[Onelifetogive]

The results:

LOFAR, LOGOOD!

[SunkenCiv]

...saying it was capable of detecting faint signals from almost as far back as the Big Bang. The LOFAR (LOw Frequency ARray) consists of 25,000 small antennas measuring between 50 centimetres and two metres across, instead of a traditional large dish, said Femke Boekhorst of the Netherlands Radioastronomy Institute.

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[bigheadfred]

Just one more beer and I don’t feel you anymore. ;-)

[bigheadfred]

Do they aim it at anything? Is it possible to aim it? Or is it just aimless research?

[Abin Sur]

Do they aim it at anything? Is it possible to aim it?

The direction of observation ("beam") is chosen electronically by phase delays between the antennas. LOFAR can observe in several directions simultaneously which allows a multi-user operation.

[bigheadfred]

So it can be focused and multi-task at the same time. I like it.

[seastay]

Help me out here; they say this
Will see more distant which would
Be seeing how things were long
Ago because it will take the radio
Waves millions of years to travel
From the distant galaxies, ok I get that,
But how is it that they can see how the
Universe was at a time near the big
Bang as this article says? If our galaxy
And all others were at the same point
In space at big bang, and presumably
We have been moving away from the center
Of the blast, how is then that the radio
Waves are just now catching up with is and
Can be captured as an event that documents
What happened, since the eaves are traveling faster
Than us, how is it they can claim to see waves
That have already passed us and are heading away and not toward us? Often when they say they can see back to the beginning
But this statement seems to make no sense to me?

[SunkenCiv]

The best research is always aimless. :’)

[nomorelurker]

I can’t believe no one has written a science fiction novel/short story/ etc. without using that title.

Nice choice of words.

[bigheadfred]

Okay, Civ, YOU are writing the proposal for the grant. I’m sure they are gonna get that. :-)

The previous post asks, to me, some relevant questions. The only reply is research is aligned to linear thinking. “Show me the money” (laugh). The universe is constantly reinventing itself. Reprocessing. Makes sense that the simple typo of a letter AGW-AGQ would disproportionately skew your results. So one just has to correlate the image produced by the Hubble on a seemingly empty portion of space with the words of Frank Poole (2001: A Space Odyssey). “My God! It’s full of stars!”

What I am trying to say is if I input my personal favorite variables I can positively HYPOTHESIZE (in THEORY) that the universe is 14 billion years old, your mama is an ape from Africa, and none of it matters cause you are gonna die in fire tomorrow.