The Role of Astronomy in Space Technology Development: the Case of Nigeria

Okere, Bonaventure; Okeke, P. N.; Mebarki, N.; Mimouni, J.

doi:10.1063/1.3518354

Cited by 1 publication

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“…Although several other African countries had nurtured strategies and plans to host radio astronomy facilities, they are yet to come to fruition. Attempts by Nigeria to build a HartRAO-like facility at Nsukka [3] and Egypt's plans [4,5] to operate a radio telescope, in the frequency range of 1.4 to 43 GHz, at Abu Simbel in the southern part of the country are all yet to succeed.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Radio astronomy in Africa: the case of Ghana

Asabere¹,

Gaylard²,

Horellou³

et al. 2015

Preprint

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South Africa has played a leading role in radio astronomy in Africa with the Hartebeesthoek Radio Astronomy Observatory (HartRAO). It continues to make strides with the current seven-dish MeerKAT precursor array (KAT-7), leading to the 64-dish MeerKAT and the giant Square Kilometer Array (SKA), which will be used for transformational radio astronomy research. Ghana, an African partner to the SKA, has been mentored by South Africa over the past six years and will soon emerge in the field of radio astronomy. The country will soon have a science-quality 32m dish converted from a redundant satellite communication antenna. Initially, it will be fitted with 5 GHz and 6.7 GHz receivers to be followed later by a 1.4 -1.7 GHz receiver. The telescope is being designed for use as a single dish observatory and for participation in the developing African Very Long Baseline Interferometry (VLBI) Network (AVN) and the European VLBI Network. Ghana is earmarked to host a remote station during a possible SKA Phase 2. The country's location of 5 • north of the Equator gives it the distinct advantage of viewing the entire plane of the Milky Way galaxy and nearly the whole sky. In this article, we present Ghana's story in the radio astronomy scene and the science/technology that will soon be carried out by engineers and astronomers.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%