Alma telescope begins study of cosmic dawn

BBC : The Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) in Chile has opened for astronomers, and its first image—taken with only 12 of the planned 66 radio antennas—has provided a view of the universe that can’t be seen by visible-light or IR telescopes. The array of linked giant antennas sits on top of the highest plateau in the Atacama desert, close to Chile’s Bolivian border. It detects wavelengths about a thousand times longer than those of visible light. The longer wavelengths allow for the study of cold objects like the clouds of dust and gas from which planets and stars form, as well as very distant objects in the early universe. One of the projects on ALMA’s docket is the study of AU Microscopii, a young star about 1% the age of our Sun with a ring of matter around it that may be in the process of coalescing into planets.