Why in news?

• Astronomers have made use of the Indian telescope “Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope”  to discover the most distant radio galaxy ever known.

The Radio galaxy:

• Radio galaxies are very rare objects in the universe. They are colossal galaxies with a supermassive black hole in their centre that actively accretes gas and dust from its surroundings.
• It is located at a distance of 12 billion light-years.
• The radio galaxy belongs to a time when the universe was only seven per cent of its current age.
• This activity initiates the launch of high-energy jet streams, which are capable of accelerating charged particles around the supermassive black hole to almost the speed of light.

Significance:

• The discovery of such galaxies at extremely large distances is important for our understanding of the formation and evolution of galaxies.
• The researchers are of the view that analysing and studying these galaxies at length also reveals the formation of primordial black holes.
• These black holes have driven and regulated the growth of galaxies.

Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope:

• National Centre for Radio Astrophysics has set up a unique facility for radio astronomical research using the metre wavelengths range of the radio spectrum, known as the Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope (GMRT).
• It is located at a site about 80 km north of Pune. GMRT consists of 30 fully steerable gigantic parabolic dishes of 45m diameter each spread over distances of upto 25 km.
• GMRT is one of the most challenging experimental programmes in basic sciences undertaken by Indian scientists and engineers.
• GMRT is a very versatile instrument for investigating a variety of radio astrophysical problems ranging from nearby Solar system to the edge of observable Universe.