SA gets star-struck

In 10 years' time, SA will celebrate the 200th anniversary of professional astronomy in the country, as it was back in 1820 that the South African Astronomical Observatory (SAAO) made its home in Cape Town.

This rich astronomical legacy is being furthered through the country's plans to host the Square Kilometre Array (SKA), set to be the most powerful telescope ever, and likely to give rise to major new discoveries in dark matter, dark energy, and the origins of the universe.

SA is competing with Australia in the bid, with the host nation to be announced in early 2012. The country is collaborating with eight African states as partners, and has suggested an area near Carnarvon in the Karoo region of the Northern Cape as the main site. Receiving stations of about 30 to 40 antennae will extend into eight other African countries, including Ghana, Kenya, Madagascar and Mauritius.

Australia has proposed Boolardy in Western Australia as its core site, with the most distant stations to be located in New Zealand. Both countries have been ramping up infrastructure, skills development and strategic partnerships as the race to house the world's biggest star-gazer enters the home stretch.

The final decision will be taken by a consortium of 14 governments, advised by an international panel of experts from the SKA Science and Engineering Committee. Scientists are busy comparing the radio interference at both sites, as well as the cost of building and operating the telescope in Africa compared to Australia.

The super radio telescope will be built and funded by a consortium of international agencies in 16 countries, and should be fully operational by 2025.

According to Dr Bernie Fanaroff, SA SKA project director, the SKA has the potential to transform the view of SA's capabilities, both within and outside the country. “It would help to persuade South Africans that we can be a leading nation in science and high technology and convince the world that Africa is a good place for technology investments.”

Fanaroff adds that it's about more than just the science. “The global economy is more and more dominated by technology and by knowledge products. We can't hope to become a wealthy country and a wealthy continent if we can't show that we can compete effectively in the global technology and knowledge economy,” he explains.

The SKA, ultimately consisting of 3 000 to 5 000 giant antenna dishes, will cost around R2 billion to build and about R200 million annually to operate, and bring major benefits for the host country.

In November, science and technology minister Naledi Pandor revealed SA could gain EUR200 million (R1.8 billion) a year for the next 20 to 30 years in investments related to the project's operations and maintenance.

Dr Tshepo Seekoe, the Department of Science and Technology's chief director of radio astronomy, notes that hosting the SKA in Africa would propel the continent to the centre of astronomy internationally.

“This prestigious facility will dominate radio astronomy science for the next three to five decades. Africa will become one of the global leaders in astronomy facilities, with the Southern African Large Telescope (SALT) near Sutherland and High Energy Stereoscopic System (HESS) in Namibia,” he explains.

Seekoe says investment in the SKA facility will result in immediate, direct benefits as well as long-term indirect benefits to the Northern Cape, SA, and African partner countries.

“Direct benefits will accrue in the form of jobs created during the design, construction and operation of the facility as well as contribution to gross domestic product,” notes Seekoe.

Astronomy has a proven track record in encouraging the youth to take up science as a career.

Dr Tshepo Seekoe, chief director of radio astronomy the Department of Science and Technology

He adds that early estimations suggest up to 10 000 temporary and 500 permanent jobs will be created in the construction phase (10 years) and operational phase (30 to 50 years) respectively.

The benefits associated with the SKA straddle human, environmental and social dimensions, notes Seekoe, contributing to the scientific and technological development of SA and Africa as a whole. These include building the basic knowledge stock and improving the skills base as well as access to international research and networks.

Furthermore, it will provide extensive terrestrial backbone infrastructure vital for improving broadband connectivity in Africa, as well as stimulating network development beyond urban areas, adds Seekoe.

SA has made several strides to advance its chances of securing the bid, and last year Cabinet approved a R1.6 billion budget to win the right to host the telescope.

SA has also begun work on two forerunner projects - the Karoo Array Telescope (MeerKAT) Precursor Array and the MeerKAT proper - near Carnarvon in the Karoo. The first seven dishes of the precursor array, called KAT-7, are already complete and busy generating images, and serve as a prototype for the larger 80-dish MeerKAT to be completed by December 2012.

This telescope, which will be the largest in the southern hemisphere, will help demonstrate the country's technical and scientific ability to run a project of this scale, says Fanaroff. He adds the KAT-7 prototype is generating great interest internationally. More than 500 international astronomers and 58 from Africa submitted proposals to work with MeerKAT once it is complete.

Professor Patrick Woudt, deputy head of the astronomy department at the University of Cape Town, explains that cooled (more sensitive) receivers are now being installed on the KAT-7 dishes, with the MeerKAT key science teams set to begin work with KAT-7and at the end of 2011.

“SA is very much on track with the development of their SKA precursor MeerKAT, both in terms of the technology developments, as well as the scientific preparations,” says Woudt, who is leading the MeerKAT Transient Key Science Project - 'ThunderKAT' - together with Professor Rob Fender from the University of Southampton.

According to Seekoe, the SKA will require the world's fastest supercomputer to process all the data it collects and ultra-fast Internet, in excess of 100Gbps, to send the data to this supercomputer.

“Both of these present opportunities to the African continent and will lead to economic growth,” he says, adding this will provide global producers with new markets in Africa.

Woudt points out that a telescope like the SKA, with a large array of combined radio telescope dishes, relies heavily on computational power to combine the signals from each telescope instantaneously, at extremely high data rates. “Ultra-fast Internet connections from the telescope site to the remote operation centre where the analysis takes place is critical as the data will be searched instantaneously for transient signals such as exploding stars and so forth,” he explains.

The Council for Scientific and Industrial Research has commissioned a team to install a 10Gbps fibre-optic link between the SALT and SKA sites and the SA National Research Network backbone in Cape Town.

The R100 million, ultra-high speed broadband link will enable researchers to process data from SALT and MeerKAT in near real-time, and significantly improve SA's chances of hosting the SKA.

Seekoe says the country is on schedule with its commitments to the SKA project. “The main priority going forward is the construction and commissioning of MeerKAT in the Northern Cape. This project represents SA's primary investment, both technologically and scientifically, to the global SKA development.”

Operating and maintaining the telescope will obviously require a skilled body of scientists, engineers and technology specialists, and programmes have focused on fostering local talent.

“We have already developed a significant group of highly skilled young people in the MeerKAT team and the universities as a result of the project,” notes Fanaroff.

The African SKA Human Capital Development Programme has awarded 216 grants for studies in astronomy and engineering from undergraduate to post-doctoral level in the past five years.

“We also have technician training programmes and will be starting an artisan training programme next year for 15 young people from the Carnarvon/Williston area,” adds Fanaroff.

“Astronomy has a proven track record in encouraging the youth to take up science as a career,” says Seekoe. “Having the SKA in your backyard will excite the youth of Africa and lead to a greater interest in science, and astronomy in particular.”

He says the telescope will need at least 500 leading scientists and engineers to operate. “This next generation of African scientists, engineers and technicians will not all remain with the SKA project, and will enrich the African science and technology in many other fields.”

Apart from its contribution to national prestige and skills development, the SKA's real impact will be the knowledge it gleans from its glimpses into the early universe.

The SKA will be 50 to 100 times more powerful than any previously constructed radio telescope, allowing astronomers to see far back into the recesses of time, to a world of nascent stars and galaxies.

“The science which the MeerKAT, C-Bass [a radio telescope in Klerefontein] and SKA will do is in itself very exciting,” says Fanaroff. It will tell scientists about the beginnings of the universe, its early history and the birth of stars, galaxies, black holes, planets and the other objects, and possibly detect other civilisations, he explains.

“It will hopefully show us what dark matter is and the role it plays in all of these things,” adds Fanroff, as well as pin down the characteristics and nature of dark energy, “which is driving the universe to expand faster and faster”.

He explains that very little is known about dark matter and dark energy, even though they are much more common than the kind of matter and energy which are visible, and with which scientists are familiar. Seekoe adds that while these two components constitute about 95% of the entire universe, the world has no understanding of them at the moment.

“The SKA will test the theories of relativity of Albert Einstein and possibly detect predicted gravitational waves,” says Seekoe. “Finally, if there is intelligent life in the universe, the SKA will be powerful enough to detect it.”

Seekoe believes it's quite possible that at least three Nobel Prizes will be awarded to scientists using the SKA. “Such prestige would put Africa at the centre of astronomy for years to come.”

Woudt adds: “With a telescope like the SKA and its new technology advances, it is the potential for discovery of the yet uncharted universe that is perhaps the most exciting aspect.

“Expect the unexpected.”

In the race to host this mega star-seeker, SA faces Australia as a bidding rival, which has also been plugging away at preparations.

In comparison with MeerKAT, the Australian SKA Pathfinder, or ASKAP, is a AU$100 million (R677 million) project to build an array of 36 dishes on the Australian Boolardy site. Once it's completed (planned for 2013), the ASKAP will be an important test bed for the SKA.

The project is running on schedule, according to its official site, with five new antennae constructed at the Murchison Radio-astronomy Observatory between September and October. This brings the total number of ASKAP antennae to six, and will form the Boolardy Engineering Test Array, scheduled for completion in the second quarter of 2011.

According to Fanaroff, the cost of building and operating the SKA in Africa is significantly lower than in Australia. “There is grid power in the Northern Cape but not in Western Australia near the Australian site, which is a major advantage for us.”

He says the Australian site has a bit less interference from GSM signals and FM broadcasting, but adds that both sites have interference from satellites, meaning the science which can be done on both is very similar.

Woudt notes that a telescope like the SKA needs to be built in a place of optimal radio quietness. “It needs to be placed at a site on earth where there is as little as possible radio frequency interference... so that this extremely sensitive telescope can pick up very faint signals from stars and galaxies at cosmological distances.”

If there is intelligent life in the universe, the SKA will be powerful enough to detect it.

Dr Tshepo Seekoe, chief director of radio astronomy the Department of Science and Technology

Fanaroff points out that working with eight other countries is more complex than working with two (Australia and New Zealand), but adds: “Having a joint bid from Africa is an advantage, especially now that it has been fully supported by all the AU heads of state”.

He notes that Australia has a much longer involvement in radio astronomy, with many skilled people. But Fanaroff remains hopeful of SA's chances. “We have been able to build up capacity very quickly... The quality of our team has been recognised and acknowledged internationally. They successfully built the KAT-7 prototype much more quickly than anyone believed possible.”

Woudt adds that the student bursary programme and SA research chair initiative have led to a substantial growth in astronomy students and staff across the country, developing strong radio astronomy groups and the associated curriculum at universities. “Both these developments have led to the current success, measured by the fact that SA is leading half of the large scientific projects on the SA SKA precursor MeerKAT.”

Of the 10 successful MeerKAT Key Science proposals, following an international call for proposals, five are led or co-led by South African astronomers, says Woudt. “This is an excellent reflection of the success of SA's efforts in developing radio astronomy in SA.”

These efforts could pay off in what would be a huge boost for the country technologically, economically and culturally. Africa is considered the cradle of humankind, with numerous discoveries here helping to reveal our ancestors' struggle for survival. Hosting the SKA would take this to a whole new level, turning the continent into the site for unravelling the mysteries of a much more ancient, stellar history.