Academician Wu Xiangping, director of the FAST Scientific Committee and chief scientist of China of the Square Kilometer Array Radio Telescope (SKA), introduced the FAST follow-up plan
Beijing, January 6 (Reporter Sun Zifa) In the early morning of January 6, Beijing time, the international cooperation team led by the researchers of the National Astronomical Observatories of the Chinese Academy of Sciences through the 500-meter aperture spherical radio telescope (FAST) known as the "Eye of China", another paper on astronomical scientific research achievements was published online by the international academic journal "Nature" with a cover article, which attracted the attention of the academic community.
As the world's largest and most sensitive single-aperture radio telescope, "China Tianyan" is "proud of the crowd" in the field of international medium and low frequency radio astronomy with strong scientific research strength:
FAST's annual observation time exceeds 5300 hours, far exceeding the work efficiency expected by international peers; FAST has discovered about 500 pulsars, becoming the most efficient astronomical equipment in the world since its operation; FAST has made significant progress in measuring interstellar magnetic fields with neutral hydrogen spectral lines, providing important observational evidence for solving the "magnetic flux problem", one of the three classical problems of star formation; FAST has obtained samples of the largest rapid radio burst event to date. For the first time, the complete energy spectrum of the rapid radio burst burst rate and its bimodal structure have been revealed; the number of pulsars discovered by fast's "Silver Road Surface Pulsar Snapshot Survey" project in less than two years has surpassed the results of the 15-year search of the American Arecibo Telescope...
Infographic: China Sky Eye (FAST) in Pingtang, Guizhou. Photo by Sun Zifa, a reporter from China News Service
On the basis of the continuous improvement of open operation efficiency and quality, how will FAST, a sky-viewing tool with ultra-high sensitivity advantages, survey the sky and decipher the starry sky in the future? How can the human eye know more and better about the universe through the "Chinese Heavenly Eye"? On the eve of the publication of the latest achievement paper based on FAST, the Chinese Academy of Sciences held the first press conference of 2022 in Beijing on January 5, introducing the high-quality open operation of the big country heavy weapon "China Tianyan" and a series of important scientific research progress, and authoritatively responding to fast follow-up development goals, planning and other topics that have attracted much attention and are worth looking forward to.
Academician Chang Jin, director of the National Astronomical Observatory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, said that FAST operation has entered the stage of good results and big results. In future observations, FAST will focus on finding sub-millisecond pulsars that the world is looking for in less than 1 millisecond, and looking for binary stars composed of pulsars and black holes, as well as conducting a neutral hydrogen survey, "which is the most advantageous place for FAST, its high sensitivity, and the expected major results in the neutral hydrogen survey."
Academician Wu Xiangping, researcher of the National Astronomical Observatory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and director of the FAST Scientific Committee, also served as the chief scientist of China in the international large scientific project "Square Kilometer Array Radio Telescope" (SKA), he said that China's radio astronomy development strategy should adhere to the combination of independent research and international cooperation, the coordinated development of single-caliber and interference arrays, domestic based on single-caliber FAST FAST, international participation in the interference array SKA, to promote FAST "see deeply" and SKA "see widely" to achieve complementarity. The goal is to keep the sensitivity of China's radio telescopes at the international level.
Wu Xiangping revealed that FAST is preparing to open 1% observation time to primary and secondary school students across the country, about 50 hours, to collect young people's ideas about the field of astronomy, primary and secondary school students put forward scientific ideas, astronomers to help them realize, and create opportunities for selected children to work with scientists in FAST.
In view of the mysterious rapid radio burst (FRB) phenomenon, neutral hydrogen universe research, pulsar search and other astronomical hotspot frontiers, what are the specific arrangements for the future of "China's Sky Eye"? The National Astronomical Observatory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences also replied one by one at the press conference.
Fast radio burst FRB 121102 occurs in distant dwarf galaxies, and scientists imitate Wang Ximeng's "Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains" to draw radio astronomy art maps. Courtesy of the National Astronomical Observatory
Fast radio bursts are the brightest mysterious phenomena in the radio band that last only a few milliseconds, first discovered in 2007 and officially named in 2013. In this regard, FAST will give full play to its sensitivity advantages, carry out rapid triggering of rapid radio burst follow-up observation, monitor magnetar stars that produce rapid radio bursts, follow up with repeated outbreaks of rapid radio bursts, deepen international cooperation in multi-band common-view observation of fast radio bursts, timely follow up observations of high-energy transient sources, special gamma bursts and ultra-bright supernovae, and explore their physical nature.
Neutral hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe, widely existing at different times in the universe, and is one of the best tracers for the distribution of matter at different scales. As an astronomical tool for detecting weak neutral hydrogen sources, the neutral hydrogen spectral lines of more than 100,000 galaxies have been detected through FAST's neutral hydrogen galaxy survey.
At present, the research team of the National Astronomical Observatory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences has completed the development of neutral hydrogen galaxy survey data processing tools and corresponding preparations, and is about to start a large-scale cosmic large-scale, local universe, intergalactic, closest galaxy and other different scale surveys, aiming to explore the distribution of cosmic matter at different scales, further understand the properties of dark matter, and interpret the process of galaxy formation and evolution.
Pulsars are the "remains" of massive stars after their death, a sugar cube-sized volume has a mass of hundreds of millions of tons, and pulsars can emit highly periodic pulses with a period of between 1.4 milliseconds and 23 seconds, which is one of the main scientific targets of international large radio telescope observations.
Equipped with a 19-beam L-band receiver, FAST is the world's most powerful pulsar search tool and the most accurate time-measuring device for pulsars, currently only 15% of the FAST sky coverage has been completed, and about 500 new pulsars have been discovered, including a batch of the faintest pulsars, large dispersion pulsars that challenge the electron distribution model of the contemporary Milky Way, millisecond pulsars, pulsars, pulsars, a batch of pattern change and elimination pulsars, and radio transient sources.
The Chinese Celestial Eye perceives the delicate interstellar magnetic field, and scientists imitate Gu Kaizhi's "Roselle Futu Scroll" to draw a radio astronomy art map. Courtesy of the National Astronomical Observatory
The National Astronomical Observatory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences will fully tap the scientific potential of FAST, and carry out orbital measurements and gravitational effect tests through pulsar polarization, timing, flickering and other methods to measure the mass of pulsars and test the strong field gravitation of pulsars.
At the same time, using the advantages of FAST discovering the very high efficiency of millisecond pulsars, the search and research of large samples of high-precision millisecond pulsars and pulsar binary stars are carried out, the candidates for Chinese pulsar time arrays (CPTA) are added, the sensitivity of gravitational waves is improved, general relativity is tested, pulsar time standards are established, and the formation and evolution of binary star systems, radiation beam structure, orbital kinematics are studied. FAST will also open the Nahertz gravitational wave astronomy window to conduct direct detection of Nahertz gravitational waves.
According to the National Astronomical Observatory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, "China Tianyan" will continue to produce scientific achievements to deepen human understanding of the universe in the direction of the origin and physical mechanism of rapid radio bursts, the study of neutral hydrogen universe, pulsar search and physical research, pulsar timing and low-frequency gravitational wave detection. (End)