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MeerKAT makes a ‘big boss’ of a discovery

Part of the core of the MeerKAT array

Part of the core of the MeerKAT array

Photo by SARAO

8th April 2022

By: Rebecca Campbell

Creamer Media Senior Deputy Editor

     

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An international group of scientists from Australia, Chile, France, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, South Korea, Spain, the UK and the US as well as from South Africa, have made a major and unplanned discovery using South Africa’s MeerKAT radio telescope array. While searching for neutral hydrogen gas, they discovered the most remote example yet found of what is called a ‘megamaser’, a phenomenon created by the collision of two galaxies.

The research team was (and will continue) looking for neutral hydrogen in a specific part of the sky, and looking for this gas in the very deep depths of the universe (or, in other words, very long ago in the past). This programme was designated ‘Looking at the Distant Universe with the MeerKAT Array’, acronymed as LADUMA. (For non-South African readers, laduma is a local word, uttered as an exclamation, upon the scoring of a goal in soccer.)

While engaged on this task, and analysing data obtained by MeerKAT, the scientists discovered a bright emission signal from hydroxyl molecules. Hydroxyl (HO) is composed of one atom of hydrogen and one atom of oxygen. When two galaxies collide, the gas each contains merges and becomes very dense. This, in turn, stimulates HO molecules to emit a radio signal known as a maser. A maser is the radio wavelength equivalent of the optical wavelength laser. When a maser signal is extremely bright, it is called a megamaser.

“When two galaxies [the size of] the Milky Way and the Andromeda Galaxy collide, beams of light shoot out from the collision and can be seen at cosmological distances,” highlighted megmaser expert, study co-author and University of Colorado (in the US) Professor Jeremy Darling. “The OH megamasers act like bright lights that say: here is a collision of galaxies that is making new stars and feeding massive black holes.”

“It’s impressive that in a single night of observations with MeerKAT, we already found a redshift [i.e. distance] record-breaking megamaser,” enthused investigation leader Dr Marcin Glowacki. “The full 3 000+ hour LADUMA survey will be the most sensitive of its kind.” Glowacki was now based at the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research node at Curtin University in Australia; previously, he was at the University of the Western Cape and the Inter-University Institute for Data-Intensive Astronomy (IDIA) in South Africa.

“MeerKAT will probably double the known number of these rare phenomena,” said Darling. “Galaxies were thought to merge more often in the past, and the newly discovered OH megamaser will allow us to test this hypothesis.”

The megamaser has been nicknamed Nkalakatha, meaning ‘big boss’. It is located at a distance of some 58 thousand billion billion kilometres – or, to put it in a different format, 58 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 km.

The data from MeerKAT was processed using sophisticated scientific algorithms in IDIA’s research cloud computing facility. IDIA was created to allow South African scientists to undertake as much research as possible using MeerKAT. It will fulfil the same function with the future international Square Kilometre Array radio telescope, which will be co-hosted by South Africa and Australia, and for which MeerKAT is one of the precursors. 

Edited by Creamer Media Reporter

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