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08-08-2013
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LEAPing with 5 Telescopes

Submitter: Roy Smits
Description: LEAPing with 5 Telescopes

On 27 July 2013, the Sardinia Radio Telescope joined in for its very first LEAP observation. It also meant the first LEAP observation in which all 5 telescopes participated.

LEAP is the Large European Array for Pulsars, an ERC-funded project in which 5 powerful European radio telescopes(*) are phased up to observe and time millisecond pulsars with Arecibo-like sensitivity. Its purpose is to detect and study the gravitational waves emitted from supermassive black hole binary mergers.

The image shows the 5 telescopes as they participated in the LEAP-run: the Lovell Telescope (UK, top left), Effelsberg (Germany, top right), the WSRT (NL, middle left), the Sardinia Radio Telescope (Italy, middle right) and the Nancay Radio Telescope (France, bottom). Except for Nancay, all pictures were taken during the first 5-telescope LEAP observation.

(*) Or, freely after the well-known nursery rhyme: Five Lords a'leaping.
Copyright: LEAP collaboration
 
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