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By Suren Musayelyan
ArmeniaNow reporter
In the past several weeks three leading Armenian physicists have been receiving congratulations from their colleagues and friends after a transnational collaboration they are part of won a prestigious prize in the field of science.
Three research projects financed by the European Commission were awarded a share of the €1m Descartes Prize for Research in early March, and among them was H.E.S.S., or the High Energy Stereoscopic System, which is an array of four big "Cherenkov" telescopes (each 13 meters in diameter) located in Namibia, South-West Africa.
Ashot Akhperjanian (left), Vardan Sahakian and the prize-winner H.E.E.S.
The project that brings together about 100 scientists from nine countries: Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Poland, the Czech Republic, Armenia, South Africa and Namibia, comes to revolutionize existing astronomical observation techniques and to increase humankind's knowledge and understanding of the Milky Way and beyond.
In the project Armenia is represented by a team from the Yerevan Physics Institute (YerPhI), Felix Aharonian, Ashot Akhperjanian and Vardan Sahakian.
YerPhI is known to have conducted related studies in the field since the 1980s. The three scientists were even awarded a presidential prize for their researches in 2005.
"As if they knew it beforehand," jokes YerPhI Deputy Director Ashot Akhperjanian, adding that the prestigious Descartes prize is often compared to the Nobel Prize awarded to teams.
"In other words, it is like winning champions' league in football as part of a multinational club," he explains.
The prize was established by the EU's European Commission in 2000 and is awarded to teams of researchers for excellence and outstanding achievements in scientific research.
The other two projects that won the 2006 prize are the Hydrosol project (which has developed a method of producing hydrogen from water-splitting) and the APOPTOSIS project, which has advanced in the understanding of apoptosis (or programmed cell death), which is expected to lead to new developments in future treatment of cancer and AIDS.
Unlike this two H.E.S.S. (which in its second meaning honors German physicist Victor Hess, who discovered cosmic rays in 1912) doesn't boast much applied significance, but YerPhI Laboratory Head Vardan Sahakian says this project and its results are very important.
"It is fundamental science, it broadens man's knowledge of the Universe, as it helps us understand and get answers to such fundamental phenomena as the generation of cosmic rays, the mechanisms of their acceleration and passage, etc.," he explains, adding that one can never say what horizons fundamental science may open up in the future.
Researches in this sphere have been conducted for a century now and many a great scientific mind have tried to get answers and provide solutions to existing problems in this area.
The H.E.S.S. telescopes in Namibia detect light emitted when cosmic gamma rays with tera electron volt energies – about a trillion times higher than the energies of normal light – are absorbed in the Earth's atmosphere. By reconstructing the trajectory of the gamma rays, an image of the very-high-energy gamma-ray sky is generated. Since its start in 1998 H.E.S.S. has provided a number of breakthroughs in this young field of astronomy, such as the first resolved image of a supernova shock wave acting as a cosmic particle accelerator, the first survey of the central region of our Galaxy revealing a large number of novel gamma-ray sources, the detailed study of high-energy radiation from the center of our Galaxy, or the discovery of a stellar black hole – a "microquasar" – generating gamma rays. The H.E.S.S. results reveal entirely new views of a "non-thermal" universe, governed by processes acting at energies well beyond the energy scales provided by even the hottest stars in the Universe.
Akhperjanian says the telescope's location in Namibia, about 1,800 meters above sea level, makes it possible to observe the stars in both northern and southern hemispheres. "Observations are usually conducted on moonless and cloudless nights, and this West-African location is famous for the number of cloudless days during the year," he says, showing a Namibian post stamp with the image of the telescopes.
One of the specific contributions of the Armenian side to the project is that part of 60 cm diameter mirrors were made at the YerPhI with the use of special coating ensuring that these mirrors can be used in outdoor conditions.
The scientists say such type of project needs to concentrate human and financial resources and often at transnational level.
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By Suren Musayelyan
ArmeniaNow reporter
In the past several weeks three leading Armenian physicists have been receiving congratulations from their colleagues and friends after a transnational collaboration they are part of won a prestigious prize in the field of science.
Three research projects financed by the European Commission were awarded a share of the €1m Descartes Prize for Research in early March, and among them was H.E.S.S., or the High Energy Stereoscopic System, which is an array of four big "Cherenkov" telescopes (each 13 meters in diameter) located in Namibia, South-West Africa.
Ashot Akhperjanian (left), Vardan Sahakian and the prize-winner H.E.E.S.
The project that brings together about 100 scientists from nine countries: Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Poland, the Czech Republic, Armenia, South Africa and Namibia, comes to revolutionize existing astronomical observation techniques and to increase humankind's knowledge and understanding of the Milky Way and beyond.
In the project Armenia is represented by a team from the Yerevan Physics Institute (YerPhI), Felix Aharonian, Ashot Akhperjanian and Vardan Sahakian.
YerPhI is known to have conducted related studies in the field since the 1980s. The three scientists were even awarded a presidential prize for their researches in 2005.
"As if they knew it beforehand," jokes YerPhI Deputy Director Ashot Akhperjanian, adding that the prestigious Descartes prize is often compared to the Nobel Prize awarded to teams.
"In other words, it is like winning champions' league in football as part of a multinational club," he explains.
The prize was established by the EU's European Commission in 2000 and is awarded to teams of researchers for excellence and outstanding achievements in scientific research.
The other two projects that won the 2006 prize are the Hydrosol project (which has developed a method of producing hydrogen from water-splitting) and the APOPTOSIS project, which has advanced in the understanding of apoptosis (or programmed cell death), which is expected to lead to new developments in future treatment of cancer and AIDS.
Unlike this two H.E.S.S. (which in its second meaning honors German physicist Victor Hess, who discovered cosmic rays in 1912) doesn't boast much applied significance, but YerPhI Laboratory Head Vardan Sahakian says this project and its results are very important.
"It is fundamental science, it broadens man's knowledge of the Universe, as it helps us understand and get answers to such fundamental phenomena as the generation of cosmic rays, the mechanisms of their acceleration and passage, etc.," he explains, adding that one can never say what horizons fundamental science may open up in the future.
Researches in this sphere have been conducted for a century now and many a great scientific mind have tried to get answers and provide solutions to existing problems in this area.
The H.E.S.S. telescopes in Namibia detect light emitted when cosmic gamma rays with tera electron volt energies – about a trillion times higher than the energies of normal light – are absorbed in the Earth's atmosphere. By reconstructing the trajectory of the gamma rays, an image of the very-high-energy gamma-ray sky is generated. Since its start in 1998 H.E.S.S. has provided a number of breakthroughs in this young field of astronomy, such as the first resolved image of a supernova shock wave acting as a cosmic particle accelerator, the first survey of the central region of our Galaxy revealing a large number of novel gamma-ray sources, the detailed study of high-energy radiation from the center of our Galaxy, or the discovery of a stellar black hole – a "microquasar" – generating gamma rays. The H.E.S.S. results reveal entirely new views of a "non-thermal" universe, governed by processes acting at energies well beyond the energy scales provided by even the hottest stars in the Universe.
Akhperjanian says the telescope's location in Namibia, about 1,800 meters above sea level, makes it possible to observe the stars in both northern and southern hemispheres. "Observations are usually conducted on moonless and cloudless nights, and this West-African location is famous for the number of cloudless days during the year," he says, showing a Namibian post stamp with the image of the telescopes.
One of the specific contributions of the Armenian side to the project is that part of 60 cm diameter mirrors were made at the YerPhI with the use of special coating ensuring that these mirrors can be used in outdoor conditions.
The scientists say such type of project needs to concentrate human and financial resources and often at transnational level.
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