radio telescope

News from high in the Chilean Andes this morning: the ALMA observatory in Chile, the largest, most ambitious ground-based astronomy tool ever created, made its first measurements today from its overlook 17,400 above sea level. The interferometric measurements of radio signals, or "fringes," from a distant quasar at sub-millimeter wavelengths prove that ALMA isn't just hype, boasting unprecedented sensitivity and resolution.

And that's using just two of the eventual 66 antennas making up the array.

After almost 50 years of waiting for aliens to contact us, Australia's Cosmos Magazine has decided to be a bit more proactive. In honor of Australia's national science week, the magazine is giving you a chance to have a message of your choice beamed to the nearest Earth-like planet.

Astronomers have discovered a billion-light-year-wide hole in the cosmos that's devoid of stars, galaxies, gas and even dark matter. The presence of empty space out there in the universe isn't shocking. It's the unusually large size of the gap that has puzzled scientists.

After initially spotting the void in 2004, the astronomers analyzed data from the Very Large Array radio telescope's Sky Survey, and found that the gap corresponded to a drop in the number of galaxies in part of the constellation Eridanus. Reporting in the Astrophysical Journal, the group says that the hole's existence isn't normal in terms of what we know from computer simulations or observational studies. So we'll just have to add this to the ever-growing list of what we don't understand about the universe.—Gregory Mone

Ever wonder what a blackhole sounds like? The sun? Remnants of the Big Bang? Yeah, neither had we but it turns out the answer is wind crossed with radio waves, an electronic heartbeat and the ocean. How? SpaceSounds has collected a handful of radio telescope recordings of pulsars, planets and machines (check out the oddly-addictive beeps of Sputnik). There are  also human voices in the mix: Kennedy gives his "Man on the Moon" speech, ground control and the Apollo spacecraft communicate, a ground operator highlights technical issues Skylab 1 experiences during liftoff.

If written description isn't hacking it, listen for yourself at spacesounds.com

Via manhattansersguide.com