Construction has started on one of the most ambitious projects in the exploration of deep space… in outback WA.
Across 74 kilometres in the Murchison region, hundreds of thousands of antennas – which look like two-metre-tall wire Christmas trees – will make up the Square Kilometre Array Telescope (SKA).
“WA is one of the last unique locations in the world that’s ‘radio quiet’: away from people, away from technology,” SKA Low Chief Operations Scientist Cath Trott told Clairsy & Lisa on Tuesday.
Thing is, we still can’t wrap our heads around just how deep into deep space this thing will be able to peek into.
“13.6 billion years into the past, 200 million years after the Big Bang,” Ms Trott deadpanned.
“The birth of the very first stars and galaxies that existed in the universe.”
Say what now.
Hit PLAY to listen in…
