New galaxy survey to precisely measure the expanding Universe

ANU will play a major role in the Taipan galaxy survey, which will for the first time measure the current expansion rate of the Universe with one per cent precision. The Taipan survey aims to resolve a nagging discrepancy between previous measurements of the current expansion rate using the 'distance ladder' method and measurements of the long-ago expansion rate using the radiation left over from the Big Bang. The new TAIPAN facility installed on the refurbished UK Schmidt Telescope, one of the ANU telescopes at Siding Spring Observatory near Coonabarabran, was launched on Thursday by the Hon Zed Seselja, Assistant Minister for Science, Jobs and Innovation. Professor Matthew Colless from the ANU Research School of Astronomy and Astrophysics and Professor Andrew Hopkins from the Australian Astronomical Observatory (AAO) will lead the Taipan galaxy survey, due to start in mid-2018, which will be the most comprehensive spectroscopic survey of the southern sky. "The Taipan survey will map the entire southern hemisphere and part of the northern hemisphere and determine both the age and size of the Universe with extraordinary precision. To do so, it will measure the position of two million galaxies and the velocities for 100,000 of those galaxies," Professor Colless said. "The survey will use the ANU-owned UK Schmidt Telescope, the only telescope in the world to combine a wide field of view and a powerful spectrograph, which together make possible such an enormous survey of more than half the sky." The TAIPAN facility on the UK Schmidt Telescope will use a new technology involving mini robots known as Starbugs.