The Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA), the world's largest astronomical project, was inaugurated in an official ceremony on Wednesday March 13 in the remote Atacama desert in Chile.
ALMA is a collaborative project between North America, Europe and East Asia. It will search space for hints regarding the dawn of the universe, including energy made by the Big Bang and dust and gas from forming galaxies. With the inauguration, ALMA has transitioned from a construction project to a fully operational observatory.
"Able to observe the Universe by detecting light that is invisible to the human eye, ALMA will show us never-before-seen details about the birth of stars, infant galaxies in the early Universe, and planets coalescing around distant suns," ALMA states on its website. "It also will discover and measure the distribution of molecules - many essential for life - that form in the space between the stars."
Chile has become a popular destination for astronomers and ALMA is located at a height of about 16,404 feet in an area where there is almost no humidity or vegetation. This allows ALMA's 66 antennas, each measuring between 23 and 39 feet, to reach farther into the universe than any other radio telescope and take images different from any seen with visible-light and infrared telescopes.
Over 500 guests attended the ceremony on Wednesday. It was broadcast live on the Internet and featured representatives of ALMA's international partners, including ESO Director General Tim de Zeeuw, Director of ALMA Thijs de Graauw and Director of the USA's National Science Foundation Subra Suresh. Chilean president Sebastián Piñera was guest of honor.
"One of our many natural resources is Chile's spectacular night sky," Piñera said. "I believe that science has been a vital contributor to the development of Chile in recent years. I am very proud of our international collaborations in astronomy, of which ALMA is the latest, and biggest outcome."
