Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Telescope

"Tianyan" redirects here. For the satellite, see Tianyan (satellite).

Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Telescope
The telescope as seen from above in 2020
Alternative namesTianyan Edit this at Wikidata
Location(s)Jinke Village, Pingtang County, Guizhou, People's Republic of China Edit this at Wikidata
Coordinates25°39′11″N 106°51′24″E / 25.6531°N 106.8567°E / 25.6531; 106.8567 Edit this at Wikidata
Wavelength0.10 m (3.0 GHz)–4.3 m (70 MHz)
First light3 July 2016 Edit this on Wikidata
Telescope styleradio telescope Edit this on Wikidata
Diameter500 m (1,640 ft 5 in) Edit this at Wikidata
Illuminated diameter300 m (984 ft 3 in) Edit this at Wikidata
Collecting area196,000 m2 (2,110,000 sq ft) Edit this at Wikidata
Illuminated area70,690 m2 (760,900 sq ft) Edit this at Wikidata
Focal length140 m (459 ft 4 in) Edit this at Wikidata
Websitefast.bao.ac.cn Edit this at Wikidata
Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Telescope is located in China
Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Telescope
Location of Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Telescope
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The Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Telescope (FAST; Chinese: 五百米口径球面射电望远镜), nicknamed Tianyan (天眼, lit. "Sky's/Heaven's Eye"), is a radio telescope located in the Dawodang depression (大窝凼洼地), a natural basin in Pingtang County, Guizhou, southwest China.[1] FAST has a 500 m (1,640 ft) diameter dish constructed in a natural depression in the landscape. It is the world's largest filled-aperture radio telescope[2] and the second-largest single-dish aperture, after the sparsely-filled RATAN-600 in Russia.[3][4]

It has a novel design, using an active surface made of 4,500 metal panels which form a moving parabola shape in real time.[5] The cabin containing the feed antenna, suspended on cables above the dish, can move automatically by using winches to steer the instrument to receive signals from different directions. It observes at wavelengths of 10 cm to 4.3 m.[6][7]

Construction of FAST began in 2011. It observed first light in September 2016.[8] After three years of testing and commissioning,[9] it was declared fully operational on 11 January 2020.[10]

The telescope made its first discovery, of two new pulsars, in August 2017.[11] The new pulsars PSR J1859-01 and PSR J1931-02—also referred to as FAST pulsar #1 and #2 (FP1 and FP2), were detected on 22 and 25 August 2017; they are 16,000 and 4,100 light years away, respectively. Parkes Observatory in Australia independently confirmed the discoveries on 10 September 2017. By September 2018, FAST had discovered 44 new pulsars,[12][13][14] and by 2021, 500.[15]

  1. ^ "中国"天眼"能不能发现外星人？" [Can Chinese Tianyan find aliens?] (in Chinese). Xinhua News Agency. 22 February 2016. Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 27 February 2016.
  2. ^ Brinks, Elias (11 July 2016). "China Opens the Aperture to the Cosmos". The Conversation. U.S. News & World Report. Archived from the original on 26 August 2016. Retrieved 12 August 2016.
  3. ^ Nan, Rendong (April 2008). Project FAST – Five hundred meter Aperture Spherical radio Telescope (PDF). China-US Bilateral Workshop on Astronomy. Beijing. Archived (PDF) from the original on 7 August 2016. Retrieved 4 July 2016.
  4. ^ "China starts building world's biggest radio telescope". New Scientist. 8 June 2011. Archived from the original on 8 December 2015. Retrieved 19 October 2015.
  5. ^ Cite error: The named reference Normile was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  6. ^ NAN, RENDONG (2011). "The Five-Hundred-Meter Aperture Spherical Radio Telescope (Fast) Project". International Journal of Modern Physics D. 20 (6). Key Laboratory for Radio Astronomy, Chinese Academy of Sciences: 989–1024. arXiv:1105.3794. Bibcode:2011IJMPD..20..989N. doi:10.1142/S0218271811019335. S2CID 26433223. Archived from the original on 15 June 2022. Retrieved 25 January 2021.
  7. ^ Li, Di (2018). "FAST in Space: Considerations for a Multibeam, Multipurpose Survey Using China's 500-m Aperture Spherical Radio Telescope (FAST)". IEEE Microwave Magazine. 19 (3). National Astronomical Observatories, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China: 112–119. arXiv:1802.03709. Bibcode:2018IMMag..19..112L. doi:10.1109/MMM.2018.2802178. S2CID 4595986. Archived from the original on 4 May 2022. Retrieved 25 January 2021.
  8. ^ Xinhua (25 September 2016). "Xi commends launch of world's largest radio telescope in China". Archived from the original on 11 October 2017. Retrieved 10 October 2017 – via China Daily.
  9. ^ "FAST Homepage in English". Archived from the original on 16 March 2017. Retrieved 15 January 2017.
  10. ^ "World's largest radio telescope starts formal operation". Xinhua. 11 January 2020. Archived from the original on 13 January 2020. Retrieved 13 January 2020.
  11. ^ Jones, Andrew (10 October 2017). "China's huge new FAST radio telescope discovers two new pulsars". GBTimes. Archived from the original on 11 October 2017. Retrieved 10 October 2017.
  12. ^ McGlaun, Shane (11 October 2017). "Chinese FAST telescope finds multiple pulsars in early use". slashgear. Archived from the original on 11 October 2017. Retrieved 11 October 2017.
  13. ^ Jones, Andrew. "China's FAST radio telescope detects three more pulsars". gbtimes. Archived from the original on 17 September 2018. Retrieved 14 December 2017.
  14. ^ "China's FAST telescope identifies 44 pulsars". scio.gov.cn. Archived from the original on 17 September 2018. Retrieved 12 September 2018.
  15. ^ "China's FAST telescope detects over 500 new pulsars - People's Daily Online". Archived from the original on 16 December 2021. Retrieved 16 December 2021.