Academia Sinica, the nation’s top research institute, signed an agreement with a Japanese space research institution in Taipei on Friday to participate in a Japan-led mission that will study the physics of outer space near the Earth.
Signed by Academia Sinica president Wong Chi-huey (翁啟惠) and Institute of Space and Astronautical Science (ISAS) director-general Saku Tsuneta, the five-year agreement represents the first formal space research mission in which Taiwan will work with a world-renowned space institution, Academia Sinica said in a statement.
In Taiwan, the project will be led by the Academia Sinica Institute of Astronomy and Astrophysics in partnership with National Cheng Kung University.
The mission, called Exploration of Energization and Radiation in Geospace (ERG), involves a small scientific research satellite that will study the behavior of highly charged electrons in the magnetosphere, the region of outer space near the Earth.
That is where the Van Allen radiation belt captures a huge volume of the highly charged energy particles that are the focal point of the study.
Japanese scientists hope that data from the satellite will help them explain how these high-energy electrons are born as they generate and vanish repeatedly during space storms, and how space storms themselves develop.
The Taiwanese team will deliver one of the project’s five key instruments, an LEP-e analyzer that collects low-energy electron data, to help the ERG satellite observe the distribution of energy and density of low-energy electrons surrounding Earth, Academia Sinica said.
The other four instruments are middle and high-energy electron analyzers, and low and middle-energy ion analyzers.
With all the data collected, researchers “can paint a comprehensive picture of the magnetosphere,” said Wang Shiang-yu, a research fellow at Academia Sinica.
By paving the way for future international opportunities in space research, the agreement will allow Taiwanese scientists to access ERG data for advanced research in geospace physics and increase their world-class space research opportunities.
It will also strengthen Taiwan’s capability in building top-notch instruments for space science missions, Academia Sinica said.
Part of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), ISAS leads Japanese scientific satellite mission developments.
JAXA is one of the world’s major space agencies, together with NASA and the European Space Agency.
The Coast Guard Administration (CGA) and Chunghwa Telecom yesterday confirmed that an international undersea cable near Keelung Harbor had been cut by a Chinese ship, the Shunxin-39, a freighter registered in Cameroon. Chunghwa Telecom said the cable had its own backup equipment, and the incident would not affect telecommunications within Taiwan. The CGA said it dispatched a ship under its first fleet after receiving word of the incident and located the Shunxin-39 7 nautical miles (13km) north of Yehliu (野柳) at about 4:40pm on Friday. The CGA demanded that the Shunxin-39 return to seas closer to Keelung Harbor for investigation over the
An apartment building in New Taipei City’s Sanchong District (三重) collapsed last night after a nearby construction project earlier in the day allegedly caused it to tilt. Shortly after work began at 9am on an ongoing excavation of a construction site on Liuzhang Street (六張街), two neighboring apartment buildings tilted and cracked, leading to exterior tiles peeling off, city officials said. The fire department then dispatched personnel to help evacuate 22 residents from nine households. After the incident, the city government first filled the building at No. 190, which appeared to be more badly affected, with water to stabilize the
DEEPER REVIEW: After receiving 19 hospital reports of suspected food poisoning, the Taipei Department of Health applied for an epidemiological investigation A buffet restaurant in Taipei’s Xinyi District (信義) is to be fined NT$3 million (US$91,233) after it remained opened despite an order to suspend operations following reports that 32 people had been treated for suspected food poisoning, the Taipei Department of Health said yesterday. The health department said it on Tuesday received reports from hospitals of people who had suspected food poisoning symptoms, including nausea, vomiting, stomach pain and diarrhea, after they ate at an INPARADISE (饗饗) branch in Breeze Xinyi on Sunday and Monday. As more than six people who ate at the restaurant sought medical treatment, the department ordered the
Taiwan plans to cull as many as 120,000 invasive green iguanas this year to curb the species’ impact on local farmers, the Ministry of Agriculture said. Chiu Kuo-hao (邱國皓), a section chief in the ministry’s Forestry and Nature Conservation Agency, on Sunday said that green iguanas have been recorded across southern Taiwan and as far north as Taichung. Although there is no reliable data on the species’ total population in the country, it has been estimated to be about 200,000, he said. Chiu said about 70,000 iguanas were culled last year, including about 45,000 in Pingtung County, 12,000 in Tainan, 9,900 in
RSS