LOFAR Jülich DE605

Another international LOFAR station has been commissioned. Yesterday, 5th October 2011, the LOFAR station "DE605" was officially opened at Jülich in Germany. Their press statement read:

Bochum, Bremen, Jülich, 5 October 2011 – At last! The LOFAR station DE605 was officially opened on the campus of Forschungszentrum Jülich. The antenna station is an integral part of the digital radio telescope and European large-scale project LOFAR (Low Frequency Array). It will contribute to measuring long-wave radio signals from the dawn of the universe. LOFAR DE605 was built in cooperation between Ruhr University Bochum, Jacobs University Bremen and Forschungszentrum Jülich with funds provided by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF).

This new station is one of five located in Germany. There are now eight operational international stations and, although there is still a lot of commissioning work to be done, it is great to see that the network has expanded so far so fast. The photograph below shows the newly completed station.

LOFAR station DE605. Image: Forschungszentrum Jülich

The opening of the facility is great news not just for the Bochum/Bremen/Jülich team, but also for the entire LOFAR facility. The addition of new baselines will improve the image quality and the additional collecting area will provide a valuable sensitivity improvement.

Congratulations to the German team on the completion of their new station!

Press-releases:

• http://www.fz-juelich.de/SharedDocs/Pressemitteilungen/UK/EN/2011/11-10-05lofar.html (IN ENGLISH)
• http://www.astro.ruhr-uni-bochum.de/lofar-station/ (IN GERMAN)