Invisible jets from tiny black holes sculpt the Galaxy
Black holes, even relatively small ones, leave dramatic “footprints” in space that extend far beyond their immediate vicinity—like ripples from a pebble dropped in a pond. New research using the MeerKAT radio telescope reveals that stellar-mass black holes (those formed from collapsed stars) shoot powerful jets of energy creating massive shockwaves, effectively carving out space and influencing their galactic neighbourhoods over thousands of years. The discoveries show smaller black holes play a much more significant role in shaping galaxies than previously thought. These findings are published today in two studies featured in the scientific journal Astronomy & Astrophysics.
‘Beyond what we’d hoped’: international telescope in Australia captures first glimpse of the Universe
The first image from the international SKA Observatory’s telescope in Australia, SKA-Low, has been released – a significant milestone in its quest to reveal an unparalleled view of our Universe.
New Technology for Ultra-Fast Data Transfer: SURF and ASTRON Establish 400G Connection
SURF and ASTRON have implemented the OpenZR+ technology to establish a 400G network connection, significantly enhancing scientific research in the Netherlands.
Astronomers Astonished: Enigmatic Distant Radio Bursts Appear to be Neutron Stars
Using the radio telescope at Westerbork, The Netherlands, astronomers have discovered two dozen of the unexplained Fast Radio Bursts. After zooming in on the signal of the distant bursts, the astronomers found a striking similarity to the radio flashes emitted by nearby, known neutron stars. The discovery is remarkable because these nearby neutron stars already produce more energy than anything achievable on Earth. The distant stars that emit the Fast Radio Bursts must somehow generate an astounding one billion times more energy than the nearby ones.
Colloquium: Reconstructing Cosmic Magnetism: New Techniques for Faraday Dispersion Recovery
© Victor Gustafsson
In this talk, I will present two algorithms aimed at reconstructing the true Faraday dispersion from radio interferometric observations. The first integrates aperture synthesis and rotation measure (RM) synthesis into a single, self-consistent framework. This joint deconvolution enables deeper cleaning and more accurate reconstruction of polarized emission, while simultaneously correcting for direction-dependent effects that are common in modern radio interferometry.
The second approach explores the use of deep learning for RM synthesis deconvolution. This method, which operates on stacks of deconvolved two-dimensional polarized images, uses a less restrictive prior than conventional algorithms, enabling the recovery of extended and complex structures in Faraday depth space.
I will begin by outlining the theoretical foundations of both RM synthesis and aperture synthesis, highlighting their formal similarities as Fourier inversion problems. This perspective provides the motivation for treating them within a unified framework. I will then introduce the two algorithms designed to reconstruct the Faraday dispersion, and discuss their underlying assumptions and computational strategies. Finally, I will present results from applying these methods to both synthetic datasets and real observational data from the LOFAR and MeerKAT radio telescopes.
CASPER Workshop 2025
Mon 08 Sep 2025 - Fri 12 Sep 2025
The CASPER workshop is a semi-annual workshop where FPGA, GPU, and general heterogeneous system programmers get together to discuss new instruments in radio astronomy, as well as the tools and libraries for developing and manipulating these instruments.