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The Astronomer Who Is Building the Largest Map of Space by Volume (vice.com)

Posted by msmash on from the next-frontier dept.

An anonymous reader shares a Motherboard report: Astronomer Mark Halpern doesn't come into work every day thinking about the fact that he is leading a team that is creating the biggest map of the universe by volume ever made. But that ambition drives his research. An professor at the University of British Columbia, Halpern is also the principal investigator of the Canadian Hydrogen Intensity Mapping Experiment, or CHIME for short, based at the Dominion Radio Astrophysical Observatory in Penticton, BC. The experiment is a collaboration between UBC, the University of Toronto, McGill, and the National Research Council of Canada. Its centerpiece is a massive halfpipe-shaped telescope that collects radio signals to detect hydrogen intensity, which is a measure of how much hydrogen is clustered in the universe, and if it has moved or spread out. The researchers can then analyse the spread of hydrogen in the universe to determine how much -- and how quickly -- the universe is expanding. "If I make a sound somewhere, it travels away from that sound in a spherical shell," Halpern said. "So we're going to map these big spherical shells as a function of distance from us, and by comparing their present speed to how big they look, that comparison tells us the expansion history of the universe."


10 of 26 comments (clear)

  1. Link? by Sigvatr · · Score: 1, Insightful

    There are no links in this article. That's bad.

    1. Re:Link? by Sigvatr · · Score: 1

      One has been edited in now. Just trying to help.

    2. Re:Link? by msmash · · Score: 1

      Thanks, appreciate it.

  2. Scale? by FatdogHaiku · · Score: 1

    If it's 1:1 he's gonna need something bigger than the production floor at Hyperspacial Engineering...
    https://vimeo.com/109836809

    --
    You have the right to remain sentient. If you give up the right to remain sentient, you will be elected to public office
    1. Re:Scale? by reboot246 · · Score: 1

      I hope they don't try to print it. Even at the scale of 1 inch = 1 parsec, that map would be a mother to fold and put back in the glove compartment!

    2. Re:Scale? by FatdogHaiku · · Score: 1

      Oh, but think of all the Staples Rewards earned buying the ink refills!

      --
      You have the right to remain sentient. If you give up the right to remain sentient, you will be elected to public office
  3. Re:What good does that do? by 110010001000 · · Score: 1

    What the heck? Is this AI? Gibberish.

  4. Re:What good does that do? by olsmeister · · Score: 1

    Big 'A' little 'i'.

  5. Re:What good does that do? by PvtVoid · · Score: 1

    Also, have you ever _really_ looked at your hand?

  6. Re:What good does that do? by youngone · · Score: 1

    Why can't I mod this +1 Heavy Drug Use?