No Arabic abstract
Magnetic fields play an important role in shaping the structure and evolution of the interstellar medium (ISM) of galaxies, but the details of this relationship remain unclear. With SKA1, the 3D structure of galactic magnetic fields and its connection to star formation will be revealed. A highly sensitive probe of the internal structure of the magnetoionized ISM is the partial depolarization of synchrotron radiation from inside the volume. Different configurations of magnetic field and ionized gas within the resolution element of the telescope lead to frequency-dependent changes in the observed degree of polarization. The results of spectro-polarimetric observations are tied to physical structure in the ISM through comparison with detailed modeling, supplemented with the use of new analysis techniques that are being actively developed and studied within the community such as Rotation Measure Synthesis. The SKA will enable this field to come into its own and begin the study of the detailed structure of the magnetized ISM in a sample of nearby galaxies, thanks to its extraordinary wideband capabilities coupled with the combination of excellent surface brightness sensitivity and angular resolution.
The Square Kilometre Array (SKA) will answer fundamental questions about the origin, evolution, properties, and influence of magnetic fields throughout the Universe. Magnetic fields can illuminate and influence phenomena as diverse as star formation, galactic dynamics, fast radio bursts, active galactic nuclei, large-scale structure, and Dark Matter annihilation. Preparations for the SKA are swiftly continuing worldwide, and the community is making tremendous observational progress in the field of cosmic magnetism using data from a powerful international suite of SKA pathfinder and precursor telescopes. In this contribution, we revisit community plans for magnetism research using the SKA, in the light of these recent rapid developments. We focus in particular on the impact that new radio telescope instrumentation is generating, thus advancing our understanding of key SKA magnetism science areas, as well as the new techniques that are required for processing and interpreting the data. We discuss these recent developments in the context of the ultimate scientific goals for the SKA era.
The Square Kilometre Array (SKA) will be a formidable instrument for the detailed study of neutral hydrogen (HI) in external galaxies and in our own Galaxy and Local Group. The sensitivity of the SKA, its wide receiver bands, and the relative freedom from radio frequency interference at the SKA sites will allow the imaging of substantial number of high-redshift galaxies in HI for the first time. It will also allow imaging of galaxies throughout the Local Volume at resolutions of <100 pc and detailed investigations of galaxy disks and the transition between disks, halos and the intergalactic medium (IGM) in the Milky Way and external galaxies. Together with deep optical and millimetre/sub-mm imaging, this will have a profound effect on our understanding of the formation, growth and subsequent evolution of galaxies in different environments. This paper provides an introductory text to a series of nine science papers describing the impact of the SKA in the field of HI and galaxy evolution. We propose a nested set of surveys with phase 1 of the SKA which will help tackle much of the exciting science described. Longer commensal surveys are discussed, including an ultra-deep survey which should permit the detection of galaxies at z=2, when the Universe was a quarter of its current age. The full SKA will allow more detailed imaging of even more distant galaxies, and allow cosmological and evolutionary parameters to be measured with exquisite precision.
Origin of magnetic fields, its structure and effects on dynamical processes in stars to galaxies are not well understood. Lack of a direct probe has hampered its study. The first phase of Square Kilometre Array (SKA-I), will have more than an order of magnitude higher sensitivity than existing radio telescopes. In this contribution, we discuss specific science cases that are of interest to the Indian community concerned with astrophysical turbulence and magnetic fields. The SKA-I will allow observations of a large number of background sources with detectable polarisation and measure their Faraday depths (FDs) through the Milky Way, other galaxies and their circum-galactic medium. This will probe line-of-sight magnetic fields in these objects well and provide field configurations. Detailed comparison of observational data with models which consider various processes giving rise to field amplification and maintenance will then be possible. Such observations will also provide the coherence scale of the fields and measure its random component. Measuring the random component is important to characterise turbulence in the medium. Observations of FDs with redshift will provide important information on magnetic field evolution as a function of redshift. The background sources could also be used to probe magnetic fields and its coherent scale in galaxy clusters and in bridges formed between interacting galaxies. Other than FDs, sensitive observations of synchrotron emission from galaxies will provide complimentary information on their magnetic field strengths in the sky plane. The core shift measurements of AGNs can provide more precise measurements of magnetic field very close (<pc) to the black hole and its evolution. The low band of SKA-I will also be useful to study circularly polarized emission from Sun and comparing various models of field configurations with observations.
We review the current status of the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) by outlining the science drivers for its Phase-1 (SKA1) and setting out the timeline for the key decisions and milestones on the way to the planned start of its construction in 2016. We explain how Phase-2 SKA (SKA2) will transform the research scope of the SKA infrastructure, placing it amongst the great astronomical observatories and survey instruments of the future, and opening up new areas of discovery, many beyond the confines of conventional astronomy.
We review how the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) will address fundamental questions in cosmology, focussing on its use for neutral Hydrogen (HI) surveys. A key enabler of its unique capabilities will be large (but smart) receptors in the form of aperture arrays. We outline the likely contributions of Phase-1 of the SKA (SKA1), Phase-2 SKA (SKA2) and pathfinding activities (SKA0). We emphasise the important role of cross-correlation between SKA HI results and those at other wavebands such as: surveys for objects in the EoR with VISTA and the SKA itself; and huge optical and near-infrared redshift surveys, such as those with HETDEX and Euclid. We note that the SKA will contribute in other ways to cosmology, e.g. through gravitational lensing and $H_{0}$ studies.