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CHINACHINA DAILY » CHINADAILY.COM.CN/NATION
4 Monday, November 23, 2015
BEIJING
Medical devicesafety promotedIn accordance with recentlyissued measures expected totake effect next year, Chinawill strengthen supervisionfor the safe use of medicaldevices, said the country’sdrug watchdog. Wang Shucai, deputy head of theDepartment of MedicalDevice Supervision with theChina Food and DrugAdministration, said illegalpurchases of medical instruments and lack of maintenance have seriouslyimpaired the quality oftreatment and patients’health.
HEBEI
Suspected serialrapist caughtThe police said on Sundaythey have caught a man suspected of raping six schoolgirls. The suspect, a 50yearold man, allegedly forced thevictims at knifepoint. Aschoolgirl was raped in September in Hebei and a policeinvestigation led to the suspect, surnamed Duan, andlinked him with another fiverapes in Beijing and Hebeithat have been reportedsince 2009. The case is stillunder investigation.
SHAANXI
Former lawmakerunder probeWu Yijian, a onetimewealthy man in Shaanxiprovince with suspected tiesto former senior politicaladviser Ling Jihua and hiswife Gu Liping, has beenremoved from his post asdeputy to the provincial People’s Congress Nov 20, thepaper.cn reported. Wu, asthe chairman of the board ofdirectors at Ginwa Investment Group, was investigated for four months in Mayand resumed work in September.
SHANDONG
Ming Dynastytomb foundArchaeologists have excavated a tomb dating back toabout 500 years with rarebrightly colored murals.Wang Zimeng with the provincial Institute of Archaeology said on Sunday thatthe tomb of the mid to lateMing Dynasty (13681644)was discovered in Zhangdian district in Zibo. Thetomb consists of three burial chambers. Exquisitemurals depicting people,dragons, a phoenix andflowers were painted in thetomb.
XINHUA— CHINA DAILY
Briefly
Large singledishtelescopes offermany and different benefits totheir users.”Chris Salter, head of theRadio Astronomy Group at theArecibo Observatory
ASTRONOMY
Massive telescope’s 30ton‘retina’ undergoes final testKey component putthrough its paces in dryrun; FAST to becomeworld’s largest eyefor scanning cosmos
By CHENG YINGQI in Beijingand YANG JUN in Guiyang
Scientists carried out thelast step in testing a key component of China’s giganticradio telescope on Saturday.After its scheduledcompletionin September, it will be thelargest such telescope in theworld.
A team successfully testedthe installation of the telescope’s “retina”, a mechanismweighing 30 metric tons andsuspended 140160 metersabove the halffinished reflector dish which will collect signals from the universe.
The telescope, 500 metersin diameter and usuallyknown as FAST, is composedof 4,500 mostly triangularpanels with sides measuring 11meters that create a parabolicshape or hemisphere. Themotion of the panels alters thecollective shape of the antenna, which is capable of reflecting radio signals from theuniverse to a focal point,where the receiver dome sits.
“So far, one of the mostimportant stepshasbeencom
pleted. We will finish installing all the panels by June 2016,and strive to debug the wholesystem by the end of September,” Li Di, a chief scientistfrom the National Astronomical Observatories affiliatedwith the Chinese Academy ofSciences, told China Daily.
The working mechanism ofFAST, or FivehundredmeterAperture Spherical Telescope,is similar to any televisionantenna on a roof, according toLi. But FAST is so much largerthat “if you fill it with wine,every one of the world’s seven
billion people could get a shareof about five bottles”, he said.
FAST is unique because4,350 panels have beendesigned to move up anddown, which enables thewhole hemisphere to rotate orto reshape.
“With a larger signal receiving area and more flexibility,FAST will be able to scan twotimes more sky area than Arecibo, with three to five timeshigher sensitivity,” Li said.
FAST was first proposed in1993 by Chinese astronomers,as one of several competing
concepts for the internationalSquare Kilometer Array project— a project by astronomersworldwide to build the nextgeneration radio observatory.
“Ultimately, exploring theunknown is the nature ofmankind, which is as visceralas feeding and clothing ourselves. It drives us to a greaterfuture,” he said.
Lister StaveleySmith, anastronomer at the Universityof Western Australia, expectsnew discoveries from FAST,including previouslyunknown pulsars in the MilkyWay and even in other moredistant galaxies.
“The FAST’s sensitivity andresolution will allow anextremely comprehensivestudy of thousands of galaxiesin different environments inthe local universe,” he said inan email exchange with China Daily.
Chris Salter, head of theRadio Astronomy Group atArecibo, said the 305meterradio telescope and FAST areboth similar in many aspectsand complementary to eachother. “I have no doubt thatFAST counts as being a veryexciting development forradio astronomy, and I enthusiastically await the commissioning of the new telescope,”he wrote in an email.
Contact the writers at chengyingqi@chinadaily.com.cn
Engineers have finished twothirds of the panels of the gigantic radio telescope in Guizhou province as of Saturday. JIANG DONG / CHINA DAILY
In quiet Guizhou,big dish can listenBy CHENG YINGQI
Mankindstartedwatchingthe sky with telescopes sinceGalileo Galilei some 400years ago.
Then, gradually, we foundout that besides visible light,there are more wavelengthsthat can be used to exploremessages coming from theuniverse — for example,radio waves.
However, a major obstaclekeeps us from hearing weakcosmic signals: Urbanization and the wide application of electronic devicesthat came with the advancement of technology.
That has driven scientistsfrom six countries, includingChina, Australia and Canada, to start searching for asite devoid of interferencefrom earthbound electromagnetic signals.
“Mobile phones, televisions, lights — whereverthere are people, there iselectromagnetic interference,” said Li Di, a chief scientist from the NationalAstronomical Observatoriesaffiliated with the ChineseAcademy of Sciences.
Pingtang, a small, sparselypopulated county located inthe mountainous regions ofGuizhou province, wasthought to be a good candidate to become home of theInternationalSquareKilometer Array, or SKA. As proposed in the 1990s, it wouldhave been the largest radiotelescope on Earth.
But the design of choicemoved toward a telescopeknown as a “synthesis array”,
in which signals from manysmall, widelyspaced dishesare combined to produceimages of very high resolution. So it was decided by theSKA committee that the telescope would be built in eitherSouth Africa or Australia.
After the plan for Pingtangwas set aside, the Chinesegovernment invested in alarge telescope known asFAST at the site. It is expected to be completed next year.
Chris Salter, head of theRadio Astronomy Group atthe Arecibo Observatory inPuerto Rico, said FAST hasits unique advantages.
“Large singledish telescopes offer many and different benefits to their users,”Salter said. “A single dish haswonderful flexibility of use,needs only a single receiversystem at any given frequency— rather than a separatereceiver system being neededfor each telescope in an array— can operate as a planetaryradar to imageandstudybodies within our solar system.”
WEATHER
Region blanketed by heavy snowBy HU YONGQIhuyongqi@chinadaily.com.cn
Key expressways wereclosed and flights were canceled over safety concerns onSunday, as a wide area ofnorthern China was hit by asnowstorm that disruptedtransportation.
At the same time, theNational Meteorological Center renewed a blue alert, thelowest level ina fourtierwarning system, for snowstorms inthe north of the country.
Snowstorms were expectedto hit Inner Mongolia autonomous region and northernprovinces of Shanxi and Hebeias well as Beijing and Tianjinmunicipalities on Monday,
with some areas likely to seesnowfall of 12 millimeters.
Schools in mountainousareas in Beijing were due to beclosed on Monday due to lasting snowfall, according tolocal education authorities.
Traffic management authorities and police patrolled highways ready to rescue potentialvictims of traffic accidents. Sixexpressways that connect Beijing to other parts of Chinawere temporarily closed toprevent traffic accidents dueto theheavy snow, said the Beijing Traffic ManagementBureau. In Tianjin, all highways were shut down until thesnow stopped falling.
On Thursday, the center hadissued a warning on the com
ing blizzard and reminded residents in northern China of thesharp decline in temperatureand possible traffic difficulties.On Saturday, the traffic wasless than the previous weekendasmanypeopleheededthewarnings and stayed home.
“Such a heavy snowfall hasnot occurred often before, andthe prewarning helped toalert people of possible dangers,” said Sun Jun, chief forecaster at the center.
Before the snow, the BeijingMunicipal Commission ofTransport organized a team of4,100 rescuers to deal withpotential accidents. The commission also prepared 1,500machines and 24,000 metrictons of deicing liquid and salt
to melt the snow.Airports canceled flights, as
the airplanes would not be ableto take off and land safely onslippery runways. The BeijingCapital International Airportalonecanceledabout150flightsby Sunday afternoon, accord
ing to the airport’s statement.More than 20 flights weredelayed at Tianjin Binhai International Airport.
Thousands of visitorsswarmed into the ForbiddenCity to experience the old palace covered in snow.
FAST has already
brought well
known overseas
trained scientists
back to China. The
prospect of acquir
ing telescope time
on the world’s larg
est radio telescope
is very alluring.Lister StaveleySmith, astronomer, University of Western Australia
China is already
expanding its
homegrown radio
astronomical talent,
and an everin
creasing number of
young Chinese
astronomers are
making names for
themselves.Chris Salter, head of theRadio Astronomy Group atArecibo Observatory
What they say
A man in his 70s, surnamed Wang, takes a cold shower after a wintry swim in Shichahai Lake in Beijing on Sunday.WEI XIAOHAO / CHINA DAILY
Soccer: Better system‘still needed in China’
“China has talented players who are good at learning,but they need to be trainedand managed under a moreprofessional system, whichhas still to be set up in thenation,” Scolari said.
Four days before Evergrande’s victory, China drew 00with the Hong Kong SpecialAdministrative Region in aqualifying match for the 2018World Cup, leaving it withonly a slim chance of makingfurther progress.
It would be China’s fourthfailed World Cup qualifyingattempt since the only time itreached the finals in 2002.
Such a setback would cast
FROM PAGE 1 a shadow over the nationalplan approved in March toprofessionalize the game’smanagement.
The association also said itwill stage a congress in Beijing next month to work onmeasures to delink itself fromgovernment administrationand to rebuild its management structure.
Wei Jixiang, vicechairman of the association, said:“All the anger and criticismfrom fans and the media areunderstandable. But wemust be patient, as it takestime to overhaul an illmanaged system.”
Qiu Quanlin in Guangzhoucontributed to this story.
With a larger signal receiving area and moreflexibility, FAST will be able to scan two
times more sky area than Arecibo.”Li Di, chief scientist from the National Astronomical Observatories
Arecibo has a fixed spherical
curvature.
FAST500m
ARECIBO305m
ARECIBO FAST
Comparing telescopic titans
FAST can reshape into a
parabolic surface.
Since it was constructed in 1963 in Arecibo, Puerto Rico, this telescope had held the record as the world’s largest telescope.
ARECIBO
FASTIt’s designed as a cable-net
structure capable
of forming a parabolic mirror.
It will be completed in 2016.
Listens for radio waves into a
single line
40°The distance it can
rotate.
Source: Skyandtelescope.com, universetoday.com, URSI CHINA DAILY