FAST telescope turns to operations from construction

FAST, China’s mind-blowing 500-metre diameter SKA Pathfinder telescope, formally switched to operations earlier this year after completing its national acceptance on 11 January 2020, when all technical specifications met the design baseline. Since its construction was completed in September 2016, the world’s largest single dish radio telescope has undergone a thorough technology verification and system performance check.

Over the past three years, FAST successfully implemented various observing modes and made remarkable early science achievements, especially in the field of pulsar science. In August 2017, FAST discovered its first pulsar, and has since discovered more than 110 new ones. In February 2018, it detected its first millisecond pulsar, which coincides with a previously unassociated gamma-ray source observed by NASA’s Fermi space telescope. The discovery of this extremely faint pulsar demonstrated FAST’s great potential for pulsar searching. In February 2020, FAST announced the discovery of a new binary millisecond pulsar in the globular cluster M13, confirmed one of the previously identified pulsars in the cluster was a ‘black widow’ binary – a type of millisecond pulsar that ‘eats’ its companion star while orbiting it – and then went on to measure the timing of all known pulsars in M13 with the highest precision to date. Soon afterwards, FAST found a ‘redback’ pulsar – a similar type of millisecond pulsar – in the globular cluster M92; the first binary pulsar to be observed there. The discovery of binary pulsars is the third milestone FAST achieved in pulsar research.

The facility’s key science projects have now started, including surveys such as the Commensal Radio Astronomy FAST Survey and the Galactic plane pulsar survey; but also projects undertaking Fast Radio Burst (FRB) research, neutral hydrogen imaging, pulsar searching in M31 and pulsar timing.

Individual Principal Investigator-led proposals will open for Chinese users this summer, and in a year’s time for international users.

FAST has already shown its unique sensitivity in all related scientific research. Observations of three rotating radio transients with FAST revealed their pulses are more frequent than previously observed. In the future, the giant telesccope is also expected to contribute to frontier research, such as the detection of gravitational waves and new FRBs as well as observing interstellar molecules.

by F. F. Kou & Bo Peng (Chinese Academy of Science Key Laboratory of FAST, NOAC)

A Special issue of Science China covering FAST early Science.

Credit: Science China

The first pulsar discovered by FAST in 2017.

Credit: NAOC