Murchison Widefield Array Information

A multi-million dollar international low-frequency telescope in Australia's Midwest. The Murchison Widefield Array (MWA) is a low-frequency radio telescope in Western Australia. The front-end of the MWA consists of 4,096 spider-like antennas arranged in 256 regular grids called tiles, spread over several kilometres within the Murchison Radio-astronomy Observatory (MRO). Data from the antennas is correlated onsite before being transmitted to the Pawsey Supercomputing Centre for long-term storage. The back-end of the telescope is an online platform: the MWA node of the All Sky Virtual Observatory (MWA-ASVO), through which scientists access calibrated MWA data. The MWAs particular attributes include: wide frequency range (70300 MHz) with flexible tuning, and The MWAs unprecedented capabilities also underpin its critical role as the first fully operational precursor instrument of the A$1 billion Square Kilometre Array (SKA) project. Currently in development, the SKA will be the worlds largest radio telescope, designed to solve the deepest mysteries of the Universe. The MWA has been developed by an international collaboration , including partners from Australia, New Zealand, Japan, China, India, Canada and the United States. The telescope is maintained and remotely operated by a small team based at the Curtin Institute of Radio Astronomy (CIRA). We acknowledge the Wajarri Yamatji people as the traditional owners of the Observatory site.