The Canadian Astronomy Long Range Plan 2020-2030 (LRP) has recommended that Canada give funding support for the construction and operation of the National Radio Astronomy Observatory’s proposed Next Generation VLA (ngVLA), a new facility that will provide transformational research capabilities across many areas of astrophysics. The LRP is a report on priorities and recommendations for Canadian astronomy over the next decade.
Successful Test Paves Way for New Planetary Radar
Collaboration between the National Radio Astronomy Observatory, the Green Bank Observatory, and Raytheon Intelligence & Space turns the Green Bank Telescope and the Very Long Baseline Array into a radar system for studying the Solar System.
Quasar Discovery Sets New Distance Record
Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), along with other telescopes, have discovered the most distant quasar yet found. The bright quasar, powered by a supermassive black hole at the core of a galaxy, is seen as it was only 670 million years after the Big Bang, and is providing valuable clues about how such huge black holes and their host galaxies formed in the early Universe.
IMAGE RELEASE: A Blazar In the Early Universe
Observations with the continent-wide Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA) reveal previously unseen details in a jet of material ejected from the core of a galaxy seen as it was when the universe was only about 7 percent of its current age.
VLA Sky Survey Reveals Newborn Jets in Distant Galaxies
Comparing data from VLA sky surveys made some two decades apart revealed that the black hole-powered “engines” at the cores of some distant galaxies have launched new, superfast jets of material during the interval between the surveys.
IMAGE RELEASE: Galaxies in the Perseus Cluster
New VLA images show how the crowded environment of a cluster of galaxies affects the individual galaxies, helping astronomers better understand some of the complex details of such an environment.