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• ASKAP Science:
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ASKAP Science

The future of cm- and m-wave astronomy lies with the Square Kilometre Array (SKA), a telescope under development by a consortium of 19 countries that will be 50 times more sensitive than any existing radio facility. A majority of the key science goals for the SKA will be addressed through large-area imaging of the Universe at frequencies from a few hundred MHz to a few GHz. The Australian SKA Pathfinder (ASKAP) is a technology demonstrator aimed in the mid-frequency range, and achieves instantaneous wide-area imaging through the development and deployment of phased-array feed systems on parabolic reflectors. The large field-of-view makes ASKAP an unprecedented synoptic telescope that will make substantial advances in SKA key science.

ASKAP will be located at the Murchison Radio Observatory (MRO) in inland Western Australia, one of the most radio-quiet locations on the Earth and one of two sites selected by the international community as a potential location for the SKA. The other site is Southern Africa.

In two papers, the first published in PASA in 2007 and the second in Experimental Astronomy in 2008, an ambitious science program for ASKAP was outlined, examining key science such as understanding the evolution, formation and population of galaxies including our own, understanding the magnetic Universe, revealing the transient radio sky and searching for gravitational waves.

The headline science goals for ASKAP as outlined in the paper are:

• The detection of a million galaxies in atomic hydrogen emission across 80% of the sky out to a redshift of 0.2 to understand galaxy formation and gas evolution in the nearby Universe.
• The detection of synchrotron radiation from 60 million galaxies to determine the evolution, formation and population of galaxies across cosmic time and enabling key cosmological tests.
• The detection of polarized radiation from over 500,000 galaxies, allowing a grid of rotation measures at 10' to explore the evolution of magnetic fields in galaxies over cosmic time.
• The understanding of the evolution of the interstellar medium of our own Galaxy and the processes that drive its chemical and physical evolution.
• The characterization of the radio transient sky through detection and monitoring of transient sources such as gamma ray bursts, radio supernovae and intra-day variables.
• The discovery and timing of up to 1000 new radio pulsars to find exotic objects and to pursue the direct detection of gravitational waves.
• The high-resolution imaging of intense, energetic phenomena through improvements in the Australian and global Very Long Baseline networks.

Science Priorities for ASKAP

In August 2008 the ATNF released the document "ATNF Science in 2010-2015". The document provides an overview of the expected scientific priorities that will be addressed by the full complement of ATNF telescopes and instrumentation.

For ASKAP, the strengths are recognised to be: 

1. its fast survey speed in both line and continuum, 
2. its excellent u-v coverage, 
3. its southern hemisphere location,
4. its radio quiet site.

Over the period 2010-2015 ASKAP will be starting operations and needs to make a big impact both scientifically and as an SKA demonstrator. The early science with ASKAP should therefore concentrate on those areas where the gains will be largest and the impact greatest. The highest scientific priorities for ASKAP are (in order):

1. Understanding galaxy formation and gas evolution in the nearby Universe through extragalactic HI surveys.  (Further details on the HI surveys outlined for ASKAP can be found here).
2. Determining the evolution, formation and population of galaxies across cosmic time via high resolution, confusion limited, continuum surveys
3. The characterization of the radio transient sky through detection and monitoring (including VLBI) of transient and variable sources
4. Exploring the evolution of magnetic fields in galaxies over cosmic time through polarization surveys

Configurations for ASKAP

See the ASKAP Array Configurations web page.

ASKAP Users

SKA Science

A link to SKA Science can be found in the left-hand index on the Astronomer pages of the International SKA website.

The radio astronomy community has identified five Key Science Projects (KSPs) that will exploit the unique capabilities of the SKA. These are:

• The Cradle of Life
• Strong-field Tests of Gravity
• The origin and Evolution of Cosmic Magnetism
• Galaxy Evolution and Cosmology
• Probing the Dark Ages

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