Receiver for 6-cm polarization observation starts working

September 9, 2004

A 6-cm receiving system with a polarimeter, made by engineers of German Max-Planck-Institute for Radio-astronomy, has been installed to the 25 radio telescope in Urumqi, the capital of western China¡¯s Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region. The new instrument for Sino-German cooperation on radio astronomy will enable Chinese astronomer to measure the polarization of radio sources for the first time.

Headed by Prof. Han Jinlin from the National Astronomical Observatories of China, a partner group between Max Planck Society and CAS on radio astronomy was set up in late 2000. The group is active in studying magnetic fields, in particular of the field in our Milky Way galaxy. The newly installed receiver will help them to obtain an unambiguous picture of magnetic field structures emerging from the disk of the Milky Way.

On August 18 and 19, scientists have made the first calibration observation with the cryogenically cooled, state-of-the-art, two-channel system. The results show that the sensitivity of the new system is one of the best over the world, even better than that of the 6-cm receiver attached to Germany¡¯s the 100m telescope. After the completion of all the testing and software development, the system will open to all Chinese astronomers for scientific observations.