Developed by China’s National Space Science Center (NSSC), part of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the Daocheng Radio Telescope is part of the Meridian Project Phase 2. In 2008, China initiated the Meridian Project, a network of 31 ground-based monitoring stations, to study space weather and investigate the processes behind severe weather events.
The Daocheng Solar Radio Telescope commenced its trial operation on July 14th. Image: China Media Group
Daocheng is the world’s largest solar telescope dedicated to solar research and the study of the Sun’s impact on Earth, with construction completed in November 2022. The system has the capability to continuously and stably monitor solar activities with high quality. NSSC stated that the observational capabilities of the Daocheng telescope, such as detecting solar bursts, have been verified after six months of debugging and testing.
Located on the edge of the Tibetan Plateau in the southwestern province of Sichuan at an altitude of over 3,800 meters above sea level, the Daocheng Radio Telescope consists of 313 6-meter-wide parabolic antennas arranged in a circular configuration with a circumference of 3.14 kilometers, surrounding a 100-meter-high calibration tower at the center. Daocheng operates in the frequency range of 150 – 450 megahertz for high-precision imaging of activities such as solar flares or solar eruptions. Additionally, the telescope aids in the study of interferometry, radio wave propagation, and minor planets.
“We are entering a golden age of solar astronomy because there are many large solar telescopes operating,” commented Maria Kazachenko, a solar physicist at the University of Colorado, Boulder.
Observatories in China will provide crucial data on solar activities that telescopes in other time zones cannot observe, according to Ding Mingde, a solar physicist at Nanjing University. Ding also emphasized the importance of global collaboration in this field.