Uncovering Radio Signals from Distant Cosmic Explosions with CHPC

Research by Tanmoy Laskar, Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Utah

The MeerKAT observatory in South Africa (shown above) is a cutting-edge radio telescope that combines 64 individual dishes into a single, highly sensitive instrument. It serves as a precursor to the Square Kilometer Array (SKA), which, once completed, will be the largest and most powerful radio telescope on Earth. However, radio interferometry, as employed by MeerKAT, presents significant computational challenges, as the data volume scales with the square of the number of antennas. Analyzing such vast datasets requires advanced techniques, including automatic data editing using statistical methods, calibration (solving eigenvalue problems and performing matrix inversions), and image reconstruction (Fourier transformation and image-domain deconvolution). These computationally intensive processes make MeerKAT data analysis highly suited to high-performance computing resources, such as those available at the Center for High Performance Computing.

Observations from the MeerKAT telescope array, analyzed with CHPC resources, have revealed radio waves from a cosmic explosion that took place when the universe was only one-seventh of its present size.

Attribution: This content was provided by researchers involved with the project and edited by staff at the CHPC.