Activate the radio telescope in the dark area of ​​the Moon

China and the Netherlands work together to operate a radio observatory in a satellite orbiting the Moon's dark side in order to receive signals after the Big Bang.

The Netherlands - China Low Frequency Explorer (NCLE) began operating after a year of orbiting the Moon. This device is located on the O Thuoc communications satellite, consisting of three 5 m long unipolar antennas that are sensitive to radio frequencies in the 80 kHz - 80 MHz range. Once the equipment is operational, the Hang Nga 4 ship can move on to the next stage of the mission.

Observatory antennas are deployed.(Photo: Science Alert).

The Radio Observatory is the result of a collaboration between the Dutch Radio Astronomical Institute (ASTROn) and the China Space Agency (CNSA). NCLE is designed to search for cosmic signals that can only be detected away from Earth's ionosphere. After 18 months in space, NCLE opened the antenna last week."We will have the opportunity to carry out observations in the night lasting 14 days on the Moon," said Klein Wolt, managing director of Radboud Radio Lab radio.

However, the antenna opening process did not go smoothly, so the antennas have not been fully opened yet. The experiment should have started earlier, but the transitional satellite had to support the landing robot longer than expected. The team speculated that the delay could cause some damage, but they decided to continue observing and will try to fully open the antenna in the near future.

With the current antenna length, Wolt and his colleagues hope to see the hydrogen emitted some 800 million years after the Big Bang. If the antenna is fully enlarged, the observatory can receive signals from the period before the first stars were born, revealing how the matter was distributed after the Big Bang and the process of formation. how do you destroy neutral hydrogen atoms.