On August 11, an interferometer test using two Japanese 7-m antennas was conducted at the Operations Support Facility (OSF) at 2900 m asl and interference fringes were successfully obtained. The target object is a variable star W Hydrae with strong emission, which is often used for test observation with radio telescopes.

This is the second interferometer test to evaluate the system performance of the Atacama Compact Array (ACA) antennas manufactured by Japan, following the
successful interferometer test with a 7- m antenna and a 12-m antenna
on May 30. These initial encouraging results provide us with a promising outlook for the subsequent evaluation tests of the ACA system.

The picture shows Shin’ichiro Asayama (System Integration Science Team Deputy Team Lead / RF Sr. Engineer at the Joint ALMA Observatory (JAO)) and Paulo Cortes (AIV Scientist at JAO) displaying the results of the interferometer test with two Japanese 7-m antennas.
[Photographed by Gianni Marconi (JAO)]