ALMA, the World's Largest Radio Telescope, Grabs Its First Images
ALMA's First Image This is ALMA's first image, showing the Antennae Galaxies in two different wavelength ranges. The image was captured during the observatory's early testing phase, using only 12 antennas working together - the array will eventually have 66. European Southern Observatory The world's largest astronomical facility has opened its eyes, turning nearly two dozen antennae toward the heavens to study the building blocks of the cosmos. The Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array consists of 20 radio antennae for now, but will contain 66 by 2013, giving it a higher resolution than the Hubble Space Telescope. Appropriately enough, the first images captured the Antennae Galaxies, a pair of colliding galaxies replete with stars and stellar nurseries. ALMA's 39- and 23-foot dish antennae can resolve areas of dense, cold gas that other telescopes could not detect. ALMA sits in the high Chilean desert, about 16,000 feet above sea level and above much...