SARAS 3

#GS-03 Science and Technology

SARAS 3:

SARAS 3 is a radio telescope built by RRI (Raman Research Institute).
SARAS is a correlation spectrometer designed for precision measurements of the cosmic radio background and faint features in the sky spectrum at long wavelengths and operates in the octave band 87.5–175 MHz.
SARAS 3 is an indigenously invented and built radio telescope that can detect extremely faint radio wave signals from the depths of time.
It can detect faint cosmological signals, especially radiation emitted by hydrogen atoms at the 21-cm wavelength (1.4 GHz) arising from the depths of the cosmos.

SARAS-3 is the first telescope worldwide to reach the required sensitivity and cross–verify the claim of the signal detection.
The telescope was first deployed in rural Timbaktu Collective in Anantapur district.
The subsequent deployment took place in the wilderness of trans–Himalayan Ladakh.
Currently the telescope has been deployed over the Dandiganahalli Lake and Sharavati backwaters since 2020.
The idea of floating the radio telescope on a raft on water, had never been conceived of in the world.
This has allowed astronomers and researchers have been able to determine properties of radio luminous galaxies formed just 200 million years post the Big Bang, a period known as the Cosmic Dawn.
The results from the SARAS 3 telescope are the first time that radio observations of the averaged 21-centimetre line have been able to provide an insight into the properties of the earliest radio loud galaxies that are usually powered by supermassive black holes.
SARAS 3 had improved the understanding of astrophysics of Cosmic Dawn by telling astronomers that less than 3% of the gaseous matter within early galaxies was converted into stars.

RRI is an autonomous research institute engaged in research in basic sciences.
The institute was founded in 1948 by the Indian physicist and Nobel Laureate Sir C V Raman.