| Acronym: Prep_SKA |
| Main Objective: The baseline design for the SKA is an interferometer array capable of imaging the radio sky at frequencies from ~70 MHz to ~25 GHz, and providing an all-sky monitoring capability at frequencies below 1 GHz. The telescope is to be built in three phases, and will be able to carry out significant scientific observations as it is being built. The concept involves parabolic dishes with innovative feeds to maximize a combination of spatial and frequency coverage; at lower frequencies phased arrays can become cost-effective and offer new operational capabilities. Technological innovation, closely paralleling commercial IT developments, is the key to the design concepts under investigation and to the target cost of 1.5 billion Euro. Data transport rates are likely to be in the range of 100 Giga-bits/sec to Tera-bits/sec, with Petaflop capacity required for the central processor. Much of the required technology is currently being developed in the course of specific design studies (including the EC funded FP6 SKA Design Study, SKADS) and the construction of several SKA Pathfinder instruments around the world. The final step of integrating the accumulated R&D knowledge into a detailed system design for the SKA, is planned to take place from 2008 to 2011, with the first three years being under the aegis of PrepSKA. |
| Reference: FP7 - 212243 |
| Funding: EU/FP7 |
| Start Date: 01-03-2008 |
| End Date: 01-03-2012 |
| Team: |
| Groups: |
| Partners: U. Manchester, U. Oxford U. Cambridge, INAF - Italy, STFC - UK, NWO - NL, CSIRO - Australia, CNRS - FR, Obs. Paris - FR, Max Planck G. - GER, U. Cornell- USA, U. Calgary - CA, JIVE - NL, ASTRON - NL, National Research Foundation - ZA, U. d'Orleans, U. of Groningen - NL, National Research Council - CA, Department of Education Science and Training - Australia |
| Local Coordinator: Domingos da Silva Barbosa |
| Links:
http://www.jb.man.ac.uk/prepska/ Internal Page |
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Associated Publications
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