The IPTA meet is a collaboration of radio astronomers from a dozen countries across the globe. The city-based National Centre for Radio Astrophysics (NCRA) is all set to host the five-day annual International Pulsar Timing Array (IPTA) meet from June 17 to 21. The meet is a collaboration of radio astronomers from a dozen countries across the globe. India has been an associate member of the IPTA for the last four years. But this is the first time that we will be hosting the annual meeting.
It uses more than 12 radio telescopes all over the world with an aim to detect ultra-low frequency gravitational waves. More than 40 expert international astronomers and 30 international students are expected to participate in the event, besides several Indian participants. The current status of the quest for ultra-low frequency Gravitational Waves and the roadmap for future technical and scientific challenges is to be the main focus of the meeting.
The IPTA is a collaboration of radio astronomers from a dozen countries across the globe. It uses more than 12 radio telescopes all over the world with an aim to detect ultra-low frequency gravitational waves. More than 40 expert international astronomers and 30 international students are expected to participate in the event, besides several Indian participants.
The current status of the quest for ultra-low frequency Gravitational Waves and the roadmap for future technical and scientific challenges is to be the main focus of the meeting.
These waves are wrinkles in space-time produced by two massive black holes, each revolving around the other. Such black holes, which weigh billion times more than our Sun, are found in the centres of colliding galaxies. These waves affect radio pulses from 10km size stars called radio pulsars by changing ever so slightly the period of radio pulsation of these stars. Measuring these periods to a precision of 10 seconds of a nano-second may help the IPTA experiment to discover Gravitational Waves with a period of about a billionth of a second.
0 Comments