China Builds More Powerful ‘Eyes’ to Study the Sun

Chinese scientists are building new devices to observe the sun from northern China, which will improve China’s ability to detect and predict space disasters caused by solar variation.

Researchers at the Ming’antu Observation Station based in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region are building three new devices to monitor the sun: a HF radio heliograph, an interplanetary scintillation telescope and a dynamic ultra-band solar radio spectrometer broad, Xinhua News Agency reported Wednesday.

These new devices, once completed, will help the base to monitor the sun in a wider range in any circumstance and at any time, either from the bottom of the solar atmosphere to the space near the Earth or under adverse weather conditions Tan Baolin, a researcher with the National Astronomical Observatories of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing, told the Global Times on Thursday.

Tan said that those devices, “like the eyes of a human,” will improve China’s ability to detect and warn of severe climatic variations such as a cosmic ray storm.

The HF radio would also fill in the gaps in observing a solar radio explosion, according to Xinhua.

Violent solar variation can trigger catastrophic space weather events and cause serious damage or disturbance to aviation, aerospace, satellite communications, navigation, networks, power transmission networks and pipelines.

The new equipment of 130 million yuan ($18.8 million) will cover an area of ​​approximately 143,333 square meters and is supposed to be completed in 2023 and will come into use in 2025, Xinhua said.

Ming’antu Observation Station is affiliated with the national astronomical observatories under the Chinese Academy of Sciences, according to Xinhua.

 

Source: SpanishPeopleDaily