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Radio astronomy and the Square Kilometre Array (SKA)

The Western Australian Government is a principal collaborator in the Australian–New Zealand bid for the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) radioastronomy project. Major SKA facilities in WA include the radio telescope at Murchison, ICRAR and the Pawsey Centre.

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About the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) project

The international Square Kilometre Array (SKA) is an exciting project to build the world’s largest radiotelescope, with 50 times the sensitivity and 10,000 times the survey speed of existing telescope arrays.

The SKA will address important questions regarding the physical nature of the Universe and the laws that govern it, and will place its host at the forefront of global radioastronomy research.

Key research areas include:

  • Galaxies, cosmology, dark matter and energy
  • Testing general relativity with pulsars and black holes
  • The origin and evolution of cosmic magnetism
  • Probing the first black holes and stars
  • Searching for life and planets.

The SKA will comprise 3,000 15-metre antennas, mostly clustered around a core area, with a series of remote arrays spaced across a continent-size baseline. The antennas will be linked by a fibre-optic network to operate as a single instrument, and will require a high-performance computing capacity able to process the equivalent of the entire World Wide Web every hour.

More information about the SKA project can be found on the International SKA website (www.ska.gov.au).

Australia and Southern Africa have been shortlisted as candidate sites for the SKA.

Australia’s bid for the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) project

Australia and New Zealand are partnering in a bid for the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) project, with remote arrays in New Zealand’s north and south islands offering a potential 5,500km baseline for optimum angular resolution.

The core site is located in the newly established Murchison Radio-astronomy Observatory (MRO), located 315 kilometres northeast of Geraldton in Western Australia’s Mid West region.

This area is sparsely populated, with exceptionally low radio interference and favourable observing conditions.  The pristine condition of the site is being preserved by the exclusion of mining activities and creation of a Mid West Radio Quiet Zone to limit incompatible radiofrequency emissions.

The final decision is expected to be announced in 2012.

Coordination of the bid for the SKA project

The principal collaborators in the Australia and New Zealand Square Kilometre Array (SKA) project are the Australian, Western Australian and New Zealand Governments, and Australia's premier science agency, the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO).

An intergovernmental body of senior officials and astronomers, the Australia New Zealand SKA Coordination Committee (ANZSCC), has been set up to coordinate the SKA bid preparation, with a view to optimising the partners’ participation in the SKA.

Further information about the Australia and New Zealand SKA project can be found at www.ska.gov.au.

Australian SKA Pathfinder telescope

As a precursor to the full Square Kilometre Array (SKA) project, an Australian SKA Pathfinder (ASKAP) telescope is being built at Murchison Radio-astronomy Observatory (MRO) by CSIRO as a technology demonstrator to prove the qualities of the candidate site.

ASKAP will be the world’s most powerful survey instrument until the SKA is in operation. It will consist of 36 antenna dishes working together as a single telescope, using innovative radio receivers to provide an unparalleled view of the sky.

ASKAP will gather more information in its first six hours of operation than has been collected by all the radio telescopes in the world over the last fifty years.

Six of ASKAP’s antennas have been built at the MRO already, with the remaining dishes expected to be in place by the end of 2011. The system should be fully operational by 2013.

International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research

 Australia and New Zealand's chances of securing the international Square Kilometre Array (SKA) project have been given a boost with Curtin University of Technology and The University of Western Australia joining forces to establish the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research (ICRAR), which was launched in 2009.

ICRAR has attracted some of the world’s leading researchers in radio astronomy to Western Australia, who have in turn contributed to national and international scientific and technical programs for the SKA and Australian SKA Pathfinder telescope (ASKAP).

To find out more visit www.icrar.org.

Pawsey High Performance Computing Centre for SKA Science

Australia and New Zealand's chances of securing the international Square Kilometre Array (SKA) project has been further buoyed with the Australian Government’s announcement of $80 million for construction of a high performance computing centre in Perth to support data-intensive research in astronomy and other fields. The Pawsey Centre will process data from the Australian SKA Pathfinder telescope (ASKAP), the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research, and potentially, one day, the SKA itself.

Design of the supercomputer infrastructure and building facilities is currently nearing completion, and the Pawsey Centre should be fully deployed during 2013.

Showcasing the capability of industry in Australia

The SKA Industry Capability Directory

The Australia–New Zealand Square Kilometre Array (SKA) Industry Capability Directory showcases a wide range of companies and organisations from both countries with the expertise and excellence required to support the development and construction of Australian SKA Pathfinder telescope (ASKAP) and in time, the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) project.

For more information visit the SKA Industry Capability Directory (www.skacapabilities.com.au/).

SKA guidelines for mining activities

The Department of Minerals and Petroleum (www.dmp.wa.gov.au) provides guidelines for mining activities related to the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) project.

A Memorandum of Understanding on Radio Quiet matters relating to the Murchison Radio-astronomy Observatory and Square Kilometre Array project.

In 2007 the Commonwealth of Australia and the state of Western Australia signed a Memorandum of Understanding (2007 MoU) in relation to Australia's bid for the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) project.

Download the full Memorandum of Understanding. (PDF)

Contact us

For further information on radioastronomy and the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) project please contact us.