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Africa Millimetre Telescope - AMT

C Koos van der Lende 2

The Africa Millimetre Telescope (AMT) project is co-led by two teams at the Radboud University Nijmegen and the University of Namibia and aims at realizing a 15-m single-dish radio telescope on the Gamsberg mountain in Namibia. Its main purpose is to provide an essential link to the network of telescopes around the globe known as the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) which has recently produced the first ever picture of a black hole. With this ground breaking accomplishment, the EHT presented the direct evidence for the existence of black holes, showing that Einstein (and hence the theory of General Relativity) was right. A major scientific breakthrough!

In addition of forming an essential link in the EHT Network, the AMT will be the only radio telescope in the mm-wavelength regime in Africa, and as such provides unique science opportunities for Namibia. By donating 80% of the observing time to Namibia, the project team tries to maximise the impact the AMT has on Namibia. The social and economic impact is further enhanced by setting up an education and outreach programme and boosting innovation and spin offs in Namibia.