The FAST staff said, “At present, the ‘China Sky Eye’ has entered an explosive period of results. FAST staff said, “At present, the ‘Chinese eye’ has entered the period of fruitful explosion.”
The 500-meter spherical radio telescope (Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Telescope, or FAST), known as the “Chinese eye”, was conceived by Chinese astronomer Nan Rendong in 1994 and built in 2016 after 22 years. It took 22 years to build and was inaugurated on September 25, 2016.
The National Astronomical Observatory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences led the construction of the world’s largest single-aperture, most sensitive radio telescope with China’s independent intellectual property rights. The comprehensive performance is ten times that of the famous radio telescope Arecibo.
On January 11, 2020, the 500-meter aperture spherical radio telescope of the “Chinese Eye” passed the national acceptance and was officially opened for operation.
At the beginning of 2022, it was officially announced that FAST had discovered about 500 pulsars, making it the most efficient pulsar discovery facility in the world since its operation. In other words, about half a year later, FAST has discovered about 160 more pulsars.
