Taiwan to probe origins of the universe
A man looks at a model of the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) detector at the Defence Ministry's Chung-Shan Institute of Science and Technology in Taoyuan County. The Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer centre is Asia's first ground control facility for the AMS detector in space. The AMS experiment, developed by the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) will search for antimatter and dark matter in space and will examine fundamental issues on the origin and structure of the Universe directly from space.
Image by: PICHI CHUANG / REUTERS
Image by: PICHI CHUANG / REUTERS
Taiwan opened a space research control centre, as part of an ambitious international project aimed at exploring the origins of the universe.
Facilities at the Payload Operations and Control Centre in the northern Lungtan township started monitoring signals transmitted from the International Space Station immediately after the inauguration.
"This is a new milestone in Taiwan's scientific and research development," President Ma Ying-jeou said at the ceremony attended by several Nobel laureates and scientists from NASA.
The centre, the first of its kind in Asia, is part of the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer, an international space research project launched in 1999.
Headed by Nobel laureate particle physicist Samuel Ting, the project measures cosmic rays, which among other things provide clues about the origins of the universe.
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