Ever wanted to look for the best route to that popular coffee shop in the next galaxy but could never find the direction on Google Map? Well, scientists have finally marked millions of galaxies to almost make a sort of “Google Map of the universe.” But this is for scientific purposes, not to quench your thirst for coffee. Well, first let’s use it for science, and if we have time, we can do a coffee run.
Thanks to a group of Australian scientists, we have a “new atlas of the universe” after the team mapped around three million galaxies in just 300 hours. The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) said on Tuesday that its new telescope, Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder (ASKAP), conducted its first survey of the entire southern sky in “record speed and detail.”
CSIRO explained that the survey is like a “Google map of the Universe” in which most of the star-like points are distant galaxies. CSIRO chief executive Dr Larry Marshall said ASKAP generate more raw data at a faster rate than Australia’s entire internet traffic.
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“In a time when we have access to more data than ever before, ASKAP and the supercomputers that support it are delivering unparalleled insights and wielding the tools that will underpin our data-driven future to make life better for everybody,” said Marshall.
This mapping will help scientists study galaxies the same way social scientists use data from the national census. David McConnell, the lead author and CSIRO astronomer, said that the astronomers from around the world will be able to use the survey to explore the unknown and study how galaxies and their supermassive black holes evolve and interact.
“For the first time, ASKAP has flexed its full muscles, building a map of the Universe in greater detail than ever before, and at record speed. We expect to find tens of millions of new galaxies in future surveys,” McConnell said in a statement.
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