The Northern Extended Millimeter Array (NOEMA) is one of the largest astronomical facilities on European ground and the most powerful

radio telescope A radio telescope is a specialized antenna and radio receiver used to detect radio waves from astronomical radio sources in the sky. Radio telescopes are the main observing instrument used in radio astronomy, which studies the radio frequency ...

in the Northern Hemisphere operating at millimeter wavelengths. It consists of a large array of twelve 15-meter antennas that can spread over distances of up to 1.7 kilometers, working together as a single telescope. NOEMA is the successor of the Plateau de Bure Interferometer and is run by the international research institute IRAM (Institut de radioastronomie millimétrique). The observatory operates at over 2500 meters above sea level on one of the most extended European high altitude sites, the Plateau de Bure in the

French Alps The French Alps are the portions of the Alps mountain range that stand within France, located in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes and Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur regions. While some of the ranges of the French Alps are entirely in France, others, such as ...

. Together with IRAM's second observatory, the IRAM 30-meter telescope, it is part of the global

Event Horizon Telescope The Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) is a large telescope array consisting of a global network of radio telescopes. The EHT project combines data from several very-long-baseline interferometry (VLBI) stations around Earth, which form a combined arr ...

array.

Operation

Instead of operating one giant telescope, NOEMA relies on several smaller and easily movable antennas placed on tracks. Together, the NOEMA antennas have the resolving power of a telescope with a diameter of more than 1.7 kilometers which is the distance between the outermost antennas. During observations, the NOEMA antennas function as a single stationary telescope, a technique called

interferometry Interferometry is a technique which uses the ''interference'' of superimposed waves to extract information. Interferometry typically uses electromagnetic waves and is an important investigative technique in the fields of astronomy, fiber opt ...

. All NOEMA antennas point towards the same cosmic source. The signals received by each antenna are combined by a supercomputer, a so called correlator, that produces images of outstanding sensitivity and resolution of the astronomical source. NOEMA functions like a variable lens camera by changing the configuration of its antennas allowing scientists to zoom-in and -out of a cosmic object and obsere the tiniest details. In its most extended configuration NOEMA shows a 0.1

arc second A minute of arc, arcminute (arcmin), arc minute, or minute arc, denoted by the symbol , is a unit of angular measurement equal to of one degree. Since one degree is of a turn (or complete rotation), one minute of arc is of a turn. The na ...

view at 350

GHz The hertz (symbol: Hz) is the unit of frequency in the International System of Units (SI), equivalent to one event (or cycle) per second. The hertz is an SI derived unit whose expression in terms of SI base units is s−1, meaning that one he ...

revealing the nature of the nearest protostellar disks and the sub-

kiloparsec The parsec (symbol: pc) is a unit of length used to measure the large distances to astronomical objects outside the Solar System, approximately equal to or (au), i.e. . The parsec unit is obtained by the use of parallax and trigonometry, and ...

scale of star forming regions of the most distant galaxies. Working with IRAM's second facility, the 30-meter telescope and its wide angle of vision, the result is a giant virtual telescope with a unique set of capabilities. Recently the telescope has leveled up to full capacity. On Sept. 30, 2022 the telescope was inaugurated and became the most powerful millimeter radio telescope in the

Northern Hemisphere The Northern Hemisphere is the half of Earth that is north of the Equator. For other planets in the Solar System, north is defined as being in the same celestial hemisphere relative to the invariable plane of the solar system as Earth's Nort ...

. https://www.space.com/noema-radio-telescope-unprecedented-observations /ref> NOEMA will also assist the

in studying

Black hole A black hole is a region of spacetime where gravitation, gravity is so strong that nothing, including light or other Electromagnetic radiation, electromagnetic waves, has enough energy to escape it. The theory of general relativity predicts t ...

s. This means NOMEA will play a key role in helping astronomers answer some of the universe's fundamental questions.

Science

Compared to

optical astronomy Visible-light astronomy encompasses a wide variety of observations via telescopes that are sensitive in the range of visible light (optical telescopes). Visible-light astronomy is part of optical astronomy, and differs from astronomies based on in ...

, which is sensitive to the hot universe (stars are generally a few thousand degrees Celsius), radiotelescopes that operate in the millimeter wavebands, such as NOEMA, probe the cold universe (around -250 degrees Celsius). NOEMA is able to see the formation of the first

galaxies A galaxy is a system of stars, stellar remnants, interstellar gas, dust, dark matter, bound together by gravity. The word is derived from the Greek ' (), literally 'milky', a reference to the Milky Way galaxy that contains the Solar System. ...

in the

universe The universe is all of space and time and their contents, including planets, stars, galaxies, and all other forms of matter and energy. The Big Bang theory is the prevailing cosmological description of the development of the universe. Acc ...

, to observe super-giant

black hole A black hole is a region of spacetime where gravitation, gravity is so strong that nothing, including light or other Electromagnetic radiation, electromagnetic waves, has enough energy to escape it. The theory of general relativity predicts t ...

s at the center of galaxies, to analyze the chemical evolution and dynamics of nearby galaxies, to detect

organic molecules In chemistry, organic compounds are generally any chemical compounds that contain carbon-hydrogen or carbon-carbon bonds. Due to carbon's ability to catenate (form chains with other carbon atoms), millions of organic compounds are known. The s ...

and possible key elements of life and to investigate the

formation of stars Star formation is the process by which dense regions within molecular clouds in interstellar space, sometimes referred to as "stellar nurseries" or "star-forming regions", Jeans instability, collapse and form stars. As a branch of astronomy, star ...

and the appearance of

planetary system A planetary system is a set of gravitationally In physics, gravity () is a fundamental interaction which causes mutual attraction between all things with mass or energy. Gravity is, by far, the weakest of the four fundamental interacti ...

s. The last 30 years, NOEMA has done pioneering work in radio astronomy. It observed the most distant

galaxy A galaxy is a system of stars, stellar remnants, interstellar gas, dust, dark matter, bound together by gravity. The word is derived from the Greek ' (), literally 'milky', a reference to the Milky Way galaxy that contains the Solar System. ...

known to date. Together with the IRAM 30-meter telescope it made the first complete and detailed radio images of nearby galaxies and their gas. NOEMA also obtained the first image of a gas

disk Disk or disc may refer to: * Disk (mathematics), a geometric shape * Disk storage Music * Disc (band), an American experimental music band * ''Disk'' (album), a 1995 EP by Moby Other uses * Disk (functional analysis), a subset of a vector sp ...

surrounding a double star system ''(Dutrey'' al. 1994). Its antennas captured for the first time a cavity in one of these disks, a major hint for the existence of a

planetary object A planetary-mass object (PMO), planemo, or planetary body is by geophysical definition of celestial objects any celestial object massive enough to achieve hydrostatic equilibrium (to be rounded under its own gravity), but not enough to sustain ...

orbiting the new star and absorbing

matter In classical physics and general chemistry, matter is any substance that has mass and takes up space by having volume. All everyday objects that can be touched are ultimately composed of atoms, which are made up of interacting subatomic partic ...

on its trajectory ( GG tau, ''Piétu'' et al. 2011 ). Together, the IRAM facilities have discovered one third of the

interstellar molecules This is a list of molecules that have been detected in the interstellar medium and circumstellar envelopes, grouped by the number of component atoms. The chemical formula is listed for each detected compound, along with any ionized form that has ...

known to date (published ApJ, 2018, ''Brett A. McGuire'').

Gallery

File:The NOEMA observatory operated by IRAM.jpg, The NOEMA observatory File:NOEMA observatory. IRAM.jpg, The NOEMA observatory, located on the Plateau de Bure in the French Alps File:NOEMA antennas under the Milky Way.jpg, The NOEMA antennas looking at the night sky File:The NOEMA observatory under the night sky.jpg, The NOEMA observatory looking at the night sky with the Milky Way.

References

External links

The NOEMA brochure.
{{Portal bar, France, Astronomy, Stars, Spaceflight, Outer space, Solar System, Education, Science Radio telescopes Interferometric telescopes Astronomical observatories in France Hautes-Alpes

Operation

Science

Gallery

See also

References

External links