China switches on its massive alien-seeking radio telescope
China has flipped the switch on its 500 metre (1,640 ft) wide radio telescope -- the largest in the world -- which is aimed at the heavens in search of extraterrestrial life.
On Sunday, officials cut the ribbon on the FAST (Five-hundred-metre Aperture Spherical Telescope), located in a basin in the mountainous Pingtang County in Guizhou, southwest China.
The 1.2 billion yuan (US$180 million) FAST has 4,450 panels, and is the size of 30 football fields.
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Scientists claimed during the launch that the "super eye in the sky" was sensitive enough to detect a cell phone in use on the moon.
These types of telescopes are meant to detect radio emissions from the sky, and could help detect faraway messages from space.
A researcher with the Chinese Academy of Sciences said that the FAST has already detected electromagnetic waves coming from a pulsar about 1,351 light-years away, Xinhua reported.
Officials also noted that the huge structure represents a leap forward in space research for China, where it has traditionally lagged behind Western powers such as the U.S. and Germany.
Researchers worked on the FAST for 17 years before construction began, the official state paper said.
Earlier this year, in constructing the telescope, the government forcibly uprooted over 9,000 residents within a 5km radius, to make way for the massive structure.
Victoria Ho is Mashable's Asia Editor, based in Singapore. She previously reported on news and tech at The Business Times, TechCrunch and ZDNet. When she isn't writing, she's making music with her band
