Credit: ALMA (ESO/NAOJ/NRAO)

The Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) — a radio telescope — has received the first of its 12-metre-wide radio antennas (pictured). The project is a multinational collaboration with a cost well in excess of US$1 billion. It will eventually consist of 54 identical antennas — along with 12 seven-metre antennas — at a site 5,000 metres above sea level in Chile's Atacama Desert.

ALMA will be used to study the Universe at millimetre and submillimetre wavelengths, providing a new window on the cool star-forming regions of the Milky Way and on early galaxies. Further antennas should be delivered throughout 2009, and the entire array is expected to be completed by the end of 2012 (see page 18).