Information technology abroad: IBM to make a software for the world’s largest radio telescope

IBM told about the development of new software for data management and analysis of incoming information from the world's largest radio telescope Square Kilometre Array (SKA), whose construction is scheduled for 2014, but its full capacity will be launched only in 10 years. IBM says that after the launch SKA in full capacity, it will generate huge volumes of data that need to be somehow stored, analyzed, sorted and study useful information while removing useless one.

At the moment the scientific community is deciding where exactly the telescope will be located - in Australia (and some adjacent regions) or in South Africa. The priority is shifting toward the latter option.

Totally the SKA project involves about 20 different government agencies from various countries. According to the calculations of researchers, the telescope will generate approximately one exabyte of data per day. IBM believes that by 2024 the power of computers will reach the indicators that will enable to operate with data in exabytes, but then the system will require sophisticated software to process data sets.

Square Kilometre Array will be 50 times more sensitive and 10,000 times faster than the most powerful radio telescope operating today. It is expected that the main tasks of SKA will be the study of relic radiation of the universe, telling about its the deep past, and a study of the so-called "dark matter". Also SKA will monitor the magnetic flares in the universe, which indicate the appearance or destruction of various solid objects.

SKA telescope will scan the neighboring galaxies in search of artificial radio emission, which may indicate the presence of extraterrestrial civilizations. In addition, SKA will explore the stars and black holes. The unique facility will be fully introduced by 2022-2. The telescope is expected to serve for at least 50 years.