U of M astronomy students get out-of-this-world upgrade

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This article was published 17/12/2024 (308 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Astronomy students at the University of Manitoba now have a celestial boon at their fingertips.

A new $500,000 observatory just outside of St. Adolphe, equipped with a powerful PlaneWave CDK350 telescope, can now be accessed remotely by students.

The upgrade replaces aging equipment and allows students to conduct studies and research from anywhere they have an internet connection, giving them a 360-degree view of the heavens above, provided there are clear skies.

“It’s a brand-new, top-of-the-line, research-grade telescope, remote-operable, and you can do research-grade astronomical projects, studying explosions in the night sky, dense globular clusters, the building blocks of galaxies and on and on,” said Tyrone Woods, assistant professor of physics and astronomy at the U of M. “It’s an astounding resource for students … and gives them a highest-calibre, top of the international class research experience.”

The school held their grand opening at the site on Tuesday, which almost didn’t happen as the road to get to the observatory needed to be cleared of snow.

Woods said it only highlighted the need for remote access.

“It’s not the most accessible site … and there’s not even a bathroom here,” he said.

Ryan Wierckx, who will start his masters program in January, helped with design and assembly work on the observatory.

“My main philosophy with designing this telescope was to make it completely remotely accessible,” he said.

That meant a robust pier made of 24-inch thick concrete that’s anchored 30 feet deep into the ground and a levelling and alignment system that ensures everything stays where it’s supposed to be.

The dome moves 360 degrees and can open completely, allowing unobstructed sky views above.

Wierckx said the new technology also makes teaching more efficient and informative.

“It’s more modern equipment,” he said. “It’s much better to train them on this equipment, so when they’re out in the field, they’re familiar with the kind of equipment a lot of universities would employ.”

First- and second-year students will observe variable stars, which tell researchers more about the lives of those stars and subtle clues to measure cosmic distances.

Students further into the program will delve deeper into the origins of the universe, Woods said, monitoring dense knots of stars known to be 13 billion years old — not that long after the universe was formed.

There are more terrestrial uses, including satellite tracking, following the exponential growth in orbital debris and studying optical communications, which allow terabyte-per-second speeds.

Wierckx’s primary interest is in galaxies, but students who look into nebulae, comets and myriad other areas of space can take advantage of the new telescope.

“Right now, we want our graduate class to be looking at globular clusters, big clusters of stars that are gravitationally bound,” he said. “By looking at them, we get a sense of the age of those clusters and really helps us gauge distances.”

scott.billeck@freepress.mb.ca