CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – Astronomers from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign will be major participants in the construction and operation of a new millimeter-wave telescope array to be located in the high desert of California. Groundbreaking for the facility – called the Combined Array for Research in Millimeter-Wave Astronomy – is set for 2 p.m. on Saturday (March 27) at Cedar Flat in the Inyo Mountains near Bishop.
CARMA is a joint venture of the California Institute of Technology, the University of California at Berkeley, the University of Maryland, and Illinois. Developing the CARMA site will involve moving the six 10-meter telescopes at Caltech’s Owens Valley Radio Observatory, along with nine 6-meter telescopes at the Berkeley-Illinois-Maryland Association array, to the new Cedar Flat location.
“By merging these two university-based millimeter arrays into one 15-telescope array, we will create a much more powerful astronomical tool for the new millennium,” said Lewis Snyder, chair of the astronomy department at Illinois and a member of the CARMA science steering committee.
According to Snyder, a major advantage of relocating the telescopes to Cedar Flat is the dry air at the site’s elevation of 7,300 feet, which is almost twice as high as the present OVRO and BIMA array locations. At the new high-altitude site, CARMA will provide unparalleled sensitivity, opening new windows into the hidden Universe.
“CARMA will be the premier millimeter-wave observatory in North America, and will be used both for conducting front-line research and for training the next generation of radio astronomers,” said James Kirkpatrick, executive associate dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at Illinois and a member of the CARMA board of representatives.
“Our participation in building and operating this important astronomical facility is in line with our excellence as a major research university, as evidenced by the recent awarding of Nobel Prizes to two of our faculty members,” Kirkpatrick said.
Astronomers using CARMA will peer into the hearts of galaxies to study the cold molecular gas that fuels star formation and feeds massive black holes. They also will study the distribution of dark energy and dark matter, identify interstellar clouds of molecules that can form the building blocks of life, and examine fluctuations in the cosmic microwave background radiation.
“These observations will address some of the most important questions in astrophysics today,” said Snyder, who was a leader in the effort to develop the combined array. “These questions include how the first stars and galaxies formed, how stars and planetary systems like our own are formed, and what the chemistry of the interstellar gas can tell us about the origins of life.”
The new array will be operated by the CARMA Association, which comprises the four partner universities. The association will coordinate the separate activities of its members through a board of representatives that includes senior administrators from each partner university and the CARMA science steering committee, made up of an equal number of scientists from Caltech and from BIMA.
The National Science Foundation has supported both the OVRO and BIMA arrays since their inception, and will continue to support CARMA operations. Construction costs for the combined array are being divided equally among the NSF, Caltech and BIMA. Astronomers around the world will have access to the facility.
