Update on the POLFAR project

As we reported last year after the Polish announcement, three new antenna stations for International LOFAR Telescope are to be constructed in Poland. At the end of 2013, POLFAR received a grant from the Polish Minister of Science and Higher Education for the construction and equipment of three international LOFAR stations as part of their national research infrastructure investment. Today we have the press release from ASTRON regarding the announcement.

Today the contract was signed for the POLFAR construction work. Specifically, the Netherlands Institute for Radio Astronomy (ASTRON) and the Polish LOFAR consortium (POLFAR) signed a contract for the construction of three new antenna stations for the International LOFAR Telescope (ILT) in the north, west and south of Poland. The signing of the contract took place at the University of Warmia and Mazury in Olsztyn in Poland in the presence of representatives of the Polish Ministry of Science and Higher Education and local governments, and representatives of the Polish astronomical and space sciences communities.

The new LOFAR stations will be located in Łazy (in southern Poland, operated by the Jagiellonian University in Krakow), Bałdy (in northern Poland, operated by the University of Warmia and Mazury in Olsztyn), and Borówiec (in western Poland, operated by the Space Research Centre of the Polish Academy of Sciences). The formal agreement between the POLFAR consortium and ASTRON now marks the start of the preparations for the roll-out of these new stations.

The new map of the ILT showing the POLFAR stations (source: ASTRON)

The International LOFAR Telescope has 38 stations in the Netherlands, six in Germany, and one each in France, Sweden, and the United Kingdom. Connecting the three new ‘POLFAR’ stations will add valuable extra sensitivity to the array. And in particular, the Polish stations give ‘baselines’ of up to 1550 km in the array, making the ILT a much more capable instrument for high resolution imaging of detailed structues. The positions of the new stations also literally provide new angles on ionospheric tomography.

All components for the LOFAR stations, such as the manufacturing of thousands of antenna elements and electronics, are to be contracted out to industry. The construction of the three new stations will start immediately and is estimated to be completed before the end of 2015. 

POLFAR -- The Polish LOFAR project

It is official!

Poland will build three new LOFAR stations.

The International LOFAR Telescope (ILT) comprises the combined LOFAR stations of  the Netherlands, Germany, France, Sweden and the United Kingdom. As we have been reporting, there are numerous other countries that are interested in joining the ILT and are attempting to raise the necessary funding to join this leading research project. It is therefore with the utmost delight that we report today that Poland is the latest to join the facility, and it intends to do so with major impact.

The Polish LOFAR Consortium (POLFAR) comprises:

• Uniwersytet Jagielloński, Kraków, 
• Centrum Badań Kosmicznych PAN, Warszawa, 
• Uniwersytet Warmińsko-Mazurski, Olsztyn, 
• Uniwersytet Mikołaja Kopernika, Toruń, 
• Centrum Astronomiczne Mikołaja Kopernika Warszawa,Toruń, 
• Uniwersytet Szczeciński, Szczecin, 
• Uniwersytet Zielonogórski, Zielona Góra, 
• Uniwersytet Przyrodniczy, Wrocław, 
• Instytut Chemii Bioorganicznej PAN, 
• Poznańskie Centrum Superkomputerowo.

It has now been officially announced that the Minister of Science and Higher Education prof. Barbara Kudrycka granted Polish consortium POLFAR 25.792.000 zł for the construction and equipment of three international stations of the European LOFAR radio astronomy system in Poland as part of their national research infrastructure investment.

Not one... but three!

Three International-class LOFAR stations is the equivalent of the LOFAR stations of France, Sweden and the UK combined! The proposed sites for the three stations are:

• Borówiec, near Poznan,
• Łazy, near Bochnia
• Bałdy, near Olsztyn

The graphic at the head of this article shows the approximate locations of those sites. These will be constructed between 2013 and 2015. They will be linked by and ultra-fast network to a new regional supercomputing centre at Poznan, and from there connections will be made to the supercomputing faciltiy at Groningnen in the Netherlands

Polish scientists aim to push ahead in a number of areas of frontline research. These will include studies of galactic magnetic fields and their dynamic impact on the rarefied interstellar and intergalactic plasma, the timing of pulsars , the distribution of neutral hydrogen in the early universe. There are plans to study expiration and renewal of active galactic nuclei as well as more local studies of the magnetosphere of the giant planets in our solar system. The POLFAR consortium will also participate in commercial programs: global navigation and local environmental research.

On behalf of the KAIRA team, we congratulate POLFAR on this impressive step forward -- a move which will push Poland ahead as a major player in low-frequency radio astronomy. We shall watch the progress with excitement and shall look forward to the first amazing results.


Links (in Polish)

• http://www.wolnaludzkosc.pl/pl/technologie-kosmos/item/63970-budowa-trzech-stacji-systemu-lofar-w-polsce
• http://europejczycy.info/26180/artykuly/polfar-nowe-okno-na-wszechswiat/

KKRRiT 2012 in Gdansk

Earlier this month, I attended the KKRRiT 2012 in Gdansk, Poland. This was to give presentations on LOFAR and KAIRA to the Polish community and to continue discussions with the POLFAR community on future possible collaborations. It was a great conference and there were a lot of very interesting results shown and productive discussions afterwards. The conference was followed by a trip to Warsaw to meet with some of the POLFAR team there. As we have reported before, there are plans in Poland to build three LOFAR stations in future, so there should be lots of interesting news coming from our colleagues down south soon!

KKRRiT 2012 conference photograph.