Latest news with #GiantMetrewaveRadioTelescope
The Hindu
04-05-2025
- Science
- The Hindu
Pune-Nashik railway corridor realignment being finalised: Vaishnaw
Union Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw has said the realignment plan for the Pune-Nashik railway project is being finalised, and work will begin once the Maharashtra government grants approval. The earlier alignment of the proposed high-speed rail corridor passed through the 15-km restricted zone around the Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope (GMRT) at Khodad village near Narayangaon, around 60 km from Pune. Also Read: Explained | Why a high-speed railway project in Maharashtra has astronomers concerned Scientists had raised concerns that the movement of trains through this zone could interfere with the functioning of the radio observatory. Mr. Vaishnaw on Saturday (May 3, 2025) said, "The GMRT holds great scientific significance, having been established with collaboration from 23 countries. Its operations could be hampered by the earlier alignment, so a realignment is being prepared to avoid any interference. Once the state government approves the new route, work can proceed." The GMRT, located about 80 km from Pune, operates in the 150-1420 MHz frequency range and comprises 30 antennas, each 45 metres in diameter. It is managed by the National Centre for Radio Astrophysics (NCRA) under the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR). Mr. Vaishnaw also announced a major upgrade for Pune railway station, citing the city's historical and industrial importance. He said the station would be equipped with world-class facilities and four new platforms. He was speaking after flagging off two new express trains, the Hadapsar-Jodhpur Express and the MGR Chennai Central-Bhagat Ki Kothi Express from Hadapsar near Pune. The Minister also said the redevelopment plans for six stations — Pune, Hadapsar, Khadki, Shivajinagar, Uruli Kanchan, and Alandi are in their final stages. He said discussions were held with Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis regarding a Vande Bharat train between Pune and Nagpur.
Time of India
03-05-2025
- Politics
- Time of India
New route for Pune-Nashik semi-high-speed rail project away from GMRT: Railway minister
Pune: Railway minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said on Saturday that the new alignment of Pune-Nashik semi-high-speed rail corridor is now ready and the same has been sent to the Maharashtra government for approval. Vaishnaw, who was in Pune for the inauguration of two trains, said, "The GMRT (Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope) is a very important facility and 24 countries have come together and formed this facility. It cannot be interfered with as any interference will stop the progress of humanity. Therefore, we have finalised an alternative route and sent it to the Maharashtra government for approval. Once it is approved, the work will start." You Can Also Check: Pune AQI | Weather in Pune | Bank Holidays in Pune | Public Holidays in Pune He said that Maharashtra Rail Infrastructure Development Corporation Limited had taken shortcuts to create the first DPR of the project. "Had they considered the observatory (GMRT) before preparing the first DPR, which was cancelled, this problem wouldn't have happened. They took some short cuts which shouldn't have been taken," Vaishaw told newspersons. by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Upto 15% Discount for Salaried Individuals ICICI Pru Life Insurance Plan Get Quote Undo Earlier this month, Vaishnaw had assured that the route of the project would be realigned. Shirur MP Amol Kolhe and former minister and NCP leader Chagan Bhujbal had been opposing the realignment of the railway corridor. Asked about the new realigned route, Vaishaw said, "These details will be announced very soon right after it is approved by the state government. The original route alignment of the project was designed to provide connectivity via Sinnar, Sangamner, Narayangaon, Manchar and Chakan." The GMRT is located along the original alignment at Khodad, around 80km north of Pune. Vaishnav added that special care was being taken for development of Pune rail division and the Pune railway station. "We had promised a few months ago that a master plan will be readied to double the capacity of the Pune station. It is now ready. Stations like Hadapsar, Alandi, Shivajinagar, Uruli, Khadki and Pune are included in the plan. Not just Pune, the same is being planned for other cities in Maharashtra as well," the minister said. He said that planning was being done seriously for development of Pune railway station. "Pune is a big city and needs more platforms. I have instructed the officials to set up stabling lines in other stations and not Pune, and focus on increasing the number of platforms. Some additional land needed for the station's development and I have been informed by Rail Land Development Authority that the land is in their possession now," the minister said. He added that the detailed project report of the third and fourth line between Pune and Lonavla was ready. "The work will now gain pace. The state government will approve the same soon following which we will place it before the central cabinet for approval. Also, the DPR of a direct rail line between Pune and Ahmednagar is ready. It will be a double line and I have studied it and instructed officials to ensure that less land is acquired for the same and they should explore it," he said. Vaishnav added that 900 modern kitchens where food would be prepared for trains were being constructed. "Of these, 550 kitchens are ready. Live kitchens in trains are risky as a fire can happen any time. All the kitchens will be ready by the end of this financial year," he said.
Yahoo
02-04-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
This Deep-Space Spiral Galaxy Does Something It Shouldn't
Scientists are scratching their heads after taking a closer look at 2MASX J23453268−0449256, a spiral galaxy with a mouthful of a name. Nearly 1 billion light-years from Earth, the galaxy contains something it shouldn't: a supermassive black hole with jets so powerful, the spiral should no longer be stable. J2345-0449—as the galaxy is thankfully also known—was found in 2014, when astronomers in India hunted down a giant radio source known to possess relativistic jets, whose blasts of plasma travel at nearly the speed of light. Even then, the astronomers knew that J2345-0449 was strange: Relativistic jets are some of the universe's most powerful particle accelerators, and they're not typically found in spiral galaxies. Adding to the mystery was the size of J2345-0449's black hole, which the team considered "unusually massive" for a bulgeless disk galaxy. They were right to be surprised. More than a decade later, the same astronomers have completed an in-depth investigation of J2345-0449 using the Hubble Space Telescope, the Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope, and the Atacama Large Millimeter Wave Array. Published last week in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, their findings highlight the galaxy's bizarre combination of structural components, which appear to contradict each other despite likely having "peacefully co-evolved." J2345-0449's jets extend 6 million light-years away from its central supermassive black hole. Credit: Bagchi and Ray et al/Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope J2345-0449 might be three times the size of the Milky Way, but its central supermassive black hole is even more intimidating: The astronomers say its mass is billions of times larger than our Sun's. (Sagittarius A, the Milky Way's black hole, is merely 4 million times as massive as the Sun.) Though black holes don't produce their own radiation, they can influence their surroundings in ways that do. J2345-0449 exhibits signs of suppressed star formation in its central region; while the mechanisms of star formation suppression aren't well known, the astronomers think feedback from J2345-0449's black hole is pumping the brakes. Accretion disks are known to "reroute" material that would otherwise fall into a black hole. When that happens—or when an accretion disk squeezes infalling material—a plasma jet forms, spewing energy outward, away from the black hole. These blasts are believed to play a role in J2345-0449's suppression of star formation, which in turn could produce powerful radio jets. But jets of this capacity would render any other spiral galaxy unstable. Galaxies of this type—including our own Milky Way—are considered too fragile for the immense turbulence produced by such jets, which could disturb the disk's wispy structure. "This discovery is more than just an oddity—it forces us to rethink how galaxies evolve, and how supermassive black holes grow in them and shape their environments," lead study author Joydeep Bagchi told the Royal Astronomical Society.
Yahoo
30-03-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Scientists find a galaxy that defies conventional wisdom
Scientists have spotted a defiant galaxy. Located nearly 1 billion light-years from Earth, the galaxy 2MASX J23453268−0449256 is a spiral, like our home the Milky Way. Yet it does something galactic researchers only thought possible in much more massive elliptical galaxies, which form through mergers of galaxies: It hosts an enormous supermassive black hole that emits powerful jets of energy into space — the type that would wreak havoc and destabilize such a spiral galaxy. "This discovery upends conventional wisdom, as such powerful jets are almost exclusively found in elliptical galaxies, not spirals," Suraj Dhiwar, a researcher at the Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics in India who coauthored the new study, told Mashable. The research was published in the peer-reviewed journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. SEE ALSO: NASA scientist viewed first Voyager images. What he saw gave him chills. Spiral galaxies are often considered too delicate to support the kind of extreme black hole activity seen in this galactic system, Joydeep Bagchi, an astrophysicist at Christ University in India who led the research, told Mashable. But this galaxy maintains its well-ordered spiral structure in the face of extreme blasts of energized particles and radiation from a black hole billions of times the mass of the sun, as you can see in the Hubble Space Telescope imagery above and below. "This discovery upends conventional wisdom." Black holes themselves — so gravitationally powerful not even light can escape their grasp — produce no radiation or light. But galactic material can rapidly spin around black holes, forming a vibrant "accretion disk" that radiates light. And sometimes material falling into a black hole can be rerouted into two giant jets, firing in opposite directions out into the universe. The Milky Way (bottom) compared to the larger galaxy 2MASX J23453268-0449256. Credit: Bagchi and Ray et al / Hubble Space Telescope The cosmic quandary of the expansive spiral galaxy 2MASX J23453268−0449256 calls for more telescopic investigation, the researchers emphasize. "It forces us to rethink how galaxies evolve, and how supermassive black holes grow in them and shape their environments," Dhiwar explained. So far, observations gathered by the Hubble Space Telescope, the Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope, and the Atacama Large Millimeter Array reveal that the galaxy doesn't only have an orderly, tranquil spiral appearance. It also maintains a bright nuclear bar-shaped mass of stars near its core (as many spiral galaxies do) and an undisturbed outer stellar ring — home to some vigorous star formation. Imagery from a radio telescope show two colossal jets shooting out from the supermassive black hole at the center of galaxy 2MASX J23453268−0449256. Credit: Bagchi and Ray et al / Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope The unusual circumstance of galaxy 2MASX J23453268−0449256 also has relevance to our galaxy. While the central supermassive black hole in the Milky Way, called Sagittarius A*, is much smaller and currently dormant, it could (one far-off day) awake. A mighty gas cloud or small dwarf galaxy could accrete around the black hole, providing the fuel needed for powerful jets of radiation to blast through our galaxy. These rapidly moving particles could pose a danger to planets. "If such jets were to form and be directed toward our solar system, they could potentially strip away planetary atmospheres, increase radiation exposure, and even trigger a mass extinction event on Earth," Bagchi said. Life on Earth has indeed thrived over eons, and eventually bounced back following mass extinctions. But might another, stoked by our massive black hole, be in the cards? Grasping how such active black holes behave in spiral galaxies can help us not just grasp the fate of our galaxy, but others. "Ultimately, this study brings us one step closer to unraveling the mysteries of the cosmos, reminding us that the universe still holds surprises beyond our imagination," Dhiwar said.
Yahoo
26-03-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
'Very rare' black hole energy jet discovered tearing through a spiral galaxy shaped like our own
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. Nearly a billion light-years away, a massive spiral galaxy is screaming into the void. The behemoth, nicknamed J2345-0449, is a giant radio galaxy, or "super spiral" galaxy roughly three times the size of the Milky Way. Like our own spiral galaxy, it harbors a supermassive black hole at its center. But unlike the Milky Way's center, J2345-0449's supermassive black hole emits powerful radio jets — streams of fast-moving charged particles that emit radio waves — stretching more than 5 million light-years long. Though scientists don't yet know what fuels the radio jets, a new study, published March 20 in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, hints at how giant spiral galaxies could form. Such strong radio jets are "very rare for spiral galaxies," Patrick Ogle, an astronomer at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, who was not involved in the study, told Live Science. "In general, they can have weak radio jets, but these powerful radio jets typically come from massive elliptical galaxies. The thought behind that is that to power these really big jets requires a very massive black hole, and one that's probably also spinning. So most spiral galaxies don't have massive enough black holes in the centers to create big jets like this." Related: Supermassive black hole at the heart of the Milky Way is approaching the cosmic speed limit, dragging space-time along with it Data from the Hubble Space Telescope, the Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope, and the Atacama Large Millimeter Array suggest that the radio jets currently prevent stars from forming near the galaxy's center. That's likely because the jets heat up nearby gases so much that they can't collapse into new stars — or push them out of the galaxy entirely. Though both J2345-0449 and the Milky Way are spiral galaxies, it's unlikely that we'll observe these powerful jets in our galactic hometown. "This galaxy is so different from the Milky Way," Ogle said. "It's a lot bigger, and the black hole is a lot more massive." Sagittarius A*, the supermassive black hole at the center of the Milky Way, is likely too small to produce radio jets as powerful as the ones observed in J2345-0449, Ogle told Live Science. Still, studying these rare galaxies could help scientists understand how the growth of supermassive black holes and of their host galaxies are related. Based on the shape of the group of stars at the center of the galaxy, it's possible that this black hole and its massive host galaxy have grown together in relative isolation, rather than gaining their mass from galaxy mergers. RELATED STORIES —Could the secret of supermassive black holes lie in ultralight dark matter? —Supermassive black holes in 'little red dot' galaxies are 1,000 times larger than they should be, and astronomers don't know why —Supermassive black hole spotted 12.9 billion light-years from Earth — and it's shooting a beam of energy right at us In the future, detailed studies of the galaxy's supermassive black hole could also explain what powers its massive radio jets. "The extreme rarity of such galaxies implies that whatever physical process had created such huge radio jets in J2345-0449 must be very difficult to realize and maintain for long periods of time in most other spiral/disc galaxies," the researchers wrote in the study. "Understanding these rare galaxies could provide vital clues about the unseen forces governing the universe," study co-author Shankar Ray, an astrophysicist at Christ University, Bangalore, said in a statement. "Ultimately, this study brings us one step closer to unravelling the mysteries of the cosmos, reminding us that the universe still holds surprises beyond our imagination."
