http://www.howitworksdaily.comDID YOU KNOW? The data collected by the SKA in one day would take 2 million years to play back on an iPod
LARGE RADIO
TELESCOPES
ACROSS EARTH
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LOFAR
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Radio astronomy
in action
To observe the universe, radio telescopes
can make use of a technique called
interferometry, which involves combining
observations from multiple antennae to
create a single image. Radio waves, while
invisible to the human eye, come from a
variety of objects in the universe and can
be converted into an image that we are
able to comprehend.
The larger the area your antennae are
spread over, known as your ‘collecting
area’, the higher your resolution. It’s
similar to having a bigger mirror on an
optical telescope, but here the mirror is
the antennae. And the SKA will make use
of the largest ‘mirror’ ever devised –
about a million square metres in total –
with a dense cluster of antennae at its
central regions spreading out into
thinner ‘arms’. This will allow it to detect
adio signals from a variety of sources,
rom magnetic fields on the Sun to
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