I
had to travel to South Africa recently on a business trip and while I
was there I found out about some really interesting science and
technology programs they are working on there. It peaked my interest
and I have been keeping up to date on the latest news on some of
them, so I was really pleased to learn that the board of African
Renaissance Fund has just approved R120 million (That's 14.6 Million
USD) worth of funding to one of the projects which will build a
network of radio telescopes across Africa's nine Square Kilometre
Array (SKA) partner countries. This is part of the African Very Long
Baseline Interferometry (VLBI) Network. The funding will mean that
the project can get under way without any delay.
South
Africa's Department of Science and Technology has been working with
eight other countries -Botswana,
Ghana, Kenya, Madagascar, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia and Zambia
for the past 3 years on finding funds to set up the network which
will be used to study a variety of things including continental
drift. VLBI is a specialized astronomy technique which makes uses of
radio telescopes which are widely spaced, but used in unison as a
single telescope to create some of the clearest and high resolution
pictures of even the most distant objects in our universe. Science
and Technology minister Naledi Pandor was quoted as saying, “The
growth of Africa as a global astronomy hub is a shared vision of
African countries to use the increasingly available broadband
infrastructure for research and economic benefits.”
I
am glad to see projects like this getting the funding that they so
desperately need. South Africa have been swiftly powering through the
astronomy ranks of late and in fact Cape Town was recently chosen to
host the International Astronomical Union Office of Astronomy for
Development. I think it will be really interesting to see what
research the network will be able to uncover.
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