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China is setting up a powerful and state-of-the-art telescope in Tibet to facilitate professional observation possible on the “roof of the world“.
The KOSMA telescope, jointly developed by Chinese and German scientists, will have a trial run by the end of this year, a scientist told state-run Xinhua today.
The telescope, a 3-meter sub-millimeter-wave instrument, is part of the Yangbajain Astronomical Observatory at Yangbajain township on the suburbs of Tibet’s capital Lhasa.
“It is China’s first sub-millimeter-wave telescope that can perform regular astronomical observation and Tibet’s first professional telescope,” said Wang Junjie, a researcher with National Astronomical Observatories of Chinese Academy of Sciences.
The new telescope is also the highest sub-millimeter-wave telescope in the Northern Hemisphere, according to Wang, who is also the leader of the telescope project.
The initiative, launched in 2009, is dedicated to joint research between several Chinese institutes and Germany’s University of Cologne.
It saw the dismantling of the KOSMA telescope in the Swiss Alps in 2009 and relocation to the current site at an altitude of 4,300 meters, one of the best places to observe cosmic rays in the world.
Wang said that superb atmospheric transparency had also made the site an ideal one.
Under the agreement, the telescope will be owned by China but the University of Cologne will be given 20 per cent of observation time after it goes operational.
Wang said the telescope will be used to study subjects including molecular clouds and star formations, and, “We expect to make breakthroughs in research.”
It is also hoped that the telescope will boost training of Chinese personnel in sub-millimeter-wave astronomy and prepare for the country’s further development of a large-scale sub-millimeter-wave telescope, the scientist said.
Sub-millimeter-wave astronomy refers to astronomical observations carried out in the region of the electromagnetic spectrum with wavelengths from approximately 0.3 to 1 millimeter.
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