The Galactic ASKAP Spectral Line Survey

GASKAP-HI – Neutral Hydrogen

Principal Investigators: Naomi McClure-Griffiths (ANU), Nickolas Pingel (ANU) and John Dickey (University of Tasmania)
GASKAP-HI is a high spectral resolution survey of the neutral hydrogen (HI) line in the Milky Way and Magellanic Systems. Compared with existing data, GASKAP-HI will achieve about an order of magnitude improvement in both brightness sensitivity and in angular resolution. GASKAP-HI will detect and map diffuse emission from atomic clouds, HI absorption toward background continuum sources from the cold neutral atomic gas, and the structures in the gas that trace the effects of stellar winds and supernova explosions. The Magellanic Clouds will show all these processes as they appear in two other, very different environments. GASKAP-HI will provide stunning images of the interstellar medium that will be indispensable for astronomers working at other wavelengths.

GASKAP-OH – ground-state Hydroxyl

Principal Investigators: Shari Breen (SKAO) and Joanne Dawson (University of Macquarie/CSIRO)
The flow of matter and energy between stars and the interstellar medium is at the heart of galaxy evolution. GASKAP-OH will help us learn how galaxies process gas into stars and back again, by observing maser and quasi-thermal emission from the four 18-cm transitions of ground-state hydroxyl (OH) in the Milky Way and Large Magellanic Cloud at unprecedented sensitivity and resolution. The survey will reveal the formation and early evolution of molecular clouds and young stars, and the end-of-life activities of old massive stars, and will refine our understanding of the structure of the Milky Way Galaxy, which has long been better determined in the Northern than the Southern sky.