Astronomers are stitching together images of the universe across seven different wavelengths—from microwaves to X-rays—to trace how galaxies, black holes, and the first stars shaped the cosmos. This research addresses a fundamental gap: we do not yet understand how supermassive black holes and galaxies co-evolved, or what the universe looked like when the first stars switched on and ended the cosmic "dark ages." By combining data from space telescopes and ground-based observatories, the team will map the star-formation history of the universe, search for heavily obscured active galactic nuclei, and study the polarization of the microwave background to probe the earliest moments after the Big Bang. This is curiosity-driven fundamental science. It will not produce a new smartphone sensor or a faster internet connection. But similar surveys in the past have reshaped our understanding of how structure forms—knowledge that underpins everything from satellite navigation (which relies on relativistic corrections) to the models of cosmic radiation that inform climate science. A clearer picture of how galaxies and black holes interact could also refine the cosmological models used to interpret data from future space missions.
View original technical description
We plan an integrated series of studies of extragalactic astrophysics and cosmology at microwave, submillimetre, far infrared, near infrared, optical and X-ray wavelengths. We will exploit the data from the current space astronomy missions SPITZER, CHANDRA and GALEX, the Japanese ASTRO-F mission due to be launched in January 2006, and the ESA missions HERSCHEL and PLANCK, due to be launched in August 2007, as well as major ground-based facilities such as the VLT, Gemini, the UKIRT UKIDSS survey, SCUBA and SCUBA2 on JCMT, and MAMBO. Our science goals include studying the star formation history of the universe at infrared and X-ray wavelengths, using X-ray spectroscopy to study relativistic effects in the vicinity of black holes, discovering and understanding very luminous dusty infrared galaxies, searching for gravitational lensed systems, very high redshift quasars, and heavily obscured active galactic nuclei, improving our understanding of foreground contaminants of the microwave background radiation as well as using the the polarization of that background to probe the early universe. By combining the result from surveys at different wavelengths we will study the interaction between accretion onto massive black holes and the early stages of galaxy formation, the role of dust in deciding the balance between X-ray, ultraviolet, optical and infrared emission from galaxies and quasars, the end of the dark ages when the universe becomes ionized, and the origin of structure in very small fluctuations in the early universe from the imprint they leave on the microwave background and in the galaxy distribution.
Plain English summaries and category classifications on this site are generated by AI and may not perfectly reflect the original research.
Is something wrong? Let us know