Download Space Explorations - Holy Cross Collegiate

Topic 5
WHAT CHANNEL IS THIS?
Electromagnetic Radiation
• Electromagnetic radiation: varying types of energy waves
emitted by stars
Radio Telescopes
• Radio waves are received from stars, galaxies,
nebulae, the Sun and even some planets.
• With the development of radio telescopes,
astronomers gain an advantage over optical
telescopes, because they are not affected by
weather, clouds, atmosphere or pollution and can
be detected day or night.
Radio Telescopes
• Much information has been
gained about the composition
and distribution of matter in
space, namely hydrogen gas
which makes up a large
proportion of matter in our
Milky Way galaxy.
• Radio telescopes are made of
metal mesh and resemble a
satellite dish, but are much
larger, curved inward and have
a receiver in the center.
Radio Telescopes
• In 1932 Karl Jansky built a radio antenna that was
able to identify radio waves from space.
• Grote Reber build a radio dish based on Jansky’s
antenna findings, where he “listened” to the sky
during the 1930’s.
– He discovered that the strongest radio waves came from
specific places in space.
– The static Reber heard became louder when he tuned
into these radio objects, the loudest being our Sun in the
Milky Way Galaxy.
Radio Telescopes
• Radio waves have wavelengths that are millions of
times longer than light waves, meaning that these
waves give less resolution, but can penetrate dust
clouds in the galaxy, where light waves cannot.
Galaxy NGC 6946
Orion
Seeing Radio Waves
• Radio telescope waves provide data, which
astronomers graph, using computers to store the
data and false color it to produce images of the
radio waves, which are coded to the strength of the
waves.
– Blues for low intensity, and as the signal gets stronger
the colors go through greens, yellows, reds and whites. .
• A powerful radio telescope in
Chile has peered deeply into
the universe and captured an
incredible sight: an ancient
black hole chowing down on a
massive snack.
New photos released by the
European Southern
Observatory (ESO) show a
distant active galaxy called
PKS 1830-211 eating huge
amounts of matter, boosting its
super-energetic jets of material
to extremely high levels. You
can watch a video fly-through
of the two new black hole
discoveries provided by ESO.
• This image combines
data from four different
space telescopes to
create a multiwavelength view of all
that remains of the
oldest documented
example of a supernova,
called RCW 86.
• The Chinese witnessed
the event in 185 A.D.,
documenting a
mysterious "guest star"
that remained in the sky
for eight months.
Seeing Radio Waves
• Radio observations have provided a whole new outlook
on objects we already knew, such as galaxies, while
revealing pulsars and quasars that had been
completely unexpected.
• Pulsar: a rapidly rotating neutron star (small radius, high
density, made mostly of neutrons)
• Quasar: a massive celestial object, emitting exceptionally large
amounts of energy, and typically having a starlike image in a
telescope. Quasars may contain massive black holes.
Connecting Radio Telescopes
• By combining several small radio telescopes (just
like they do with optical telescopes) greater
resolving power can be achieved. This is referred to
as radio interferometry, improving the accuracy and
performance of the image in making radio maps.
The greater the distance between the radio
telescopes the more accurately they can measure
position.
ALMA: Global Collaboration
Radio Telescopes Bigger Than Earth
• Telescopes can now be connected without wires,
thanks to computers and clocks. This method is
called Very Long Base Interferometry (VLBI).
Radio Telescopes Bigger Than Earth
• With this technique, images 100 times that of the
largest optical telescope can be captured. This is
done by capturing images from any or all radio
telescopes in the world. Imagine a telescope as
large as the Earth itself!