C.O.R.Y. gets to work, exploring the skies

CORY (Image: Blackrock Castle Observatory)

After receiving hundreds of entries to their Name the Big Dish competition, Blackrock Castle Observatory have chosen a winner. Drum roll please....

Rebecca Cantwell from Regina Mundi in Douglas, Cork came up with the winning name: C.O.R.Y., which stands for "Computer Operated Radio Yoke".

BCO said in a statement that the name "shows not only Rebecca’s Cork wit but also her knowledge of astronomy and science".

Rebecca joined NASA astronaut Greg Johnson in activating and lighting up CORY last night when it officially began receiving visual and audio signals from space - making it the largest radio dish available for educational purposes in Europe!

The 32 metre dish is based at the National Space Centre, at Elfordstown Earthstation near Midleton in Co. Cork and was originally constructed in 1984 to carry transatlantic telephone calls from Europe to the US. It was retired from this function in the mid 90's when underground cables were laid.

Now, in a partnership between the National Space Centre and Cork Institute of Technology, the dish is being refurbished to act as a state-of-the-art educational and research tool.

Minister for Research and Innovation, Sean Sherlock TD with CORY (Image: Blackrock Castle Observatory)

Dr Niall Smith, Head of Research at CIT, who outlined Phase I and Phase II of the project said that “This project will see a €10m radio telescope brought back to life for less than €10,000 thanks to the partnership between National Space Centre and CIT. It’s a great example of using world-class infrastructure in the most cost-effective way to reach out into the community and to embed our growing scientific heritage alongside our world-renowned culture.

It will excite students in schools who will get to listen in on the radio signals from outer space; it will be a testbed for engineering and science projects from primary through to PhD; it will be available to researchers from across Ireland and beyond; it will be an iconic structure only minutes from the famous Jameson Distillery, which we hope in the future to open to tourists and public alike.”

Phase 1 of the project to refurbish the telescope is now complete and next year it is hoped to see the further refurbishment of the dish allowing it to turn and slew as it originally did, along with the installation of new sensors and receivers.

The dish is capable of detecting a host of cosmic phenomena including:

    the emission of giant slow moving hydrogen clouds
    the violent explosions of stars
    eruptions of the solar surface
    storms on Jupiter
    enormous galaxy-scale jets of quasars

The switch-on ceremony took place as part of Science Week, which continues until next Sunday.

Well done SciFest

Well done to everyone who took part in SciFest at Cork Institute of Technology last Friday. 

There were over 220 students participating in Cork, either as individulas or in group projects, from 16 different schools in Cork City and County.

This is a great achievement for the organisers, but I can't help feeling there should be more schools taking part. Although it may well cause some headaches for the organisers (the Student Union Building was barely able to contain the huge numbers of students taking part) it would be fabulous to see even more schools participating.

There were 90 different projects exhibiting across Junior, Intermediate and Senior categories. These projects came from a diverse range of fields and disciplines.

The event was opened by Minister of State for Disability, Equality & Mental Health who clearly relished in the oppurtunity to view the products of the student's research and spoke very eloquently regarding the value of science to the community and to the country.

Judging, as you can imagine, was a difficult task given the hihgh quality of the projects on display. Some of my personal favourites included a project by James Harte of Colaiste Choilm, Ballincollig who was investigating the production of UV radiation by a variety of light sources. His project was well developed and presented with an obvious flair and enthusiasm.

A group from Davis College, Mallow also impressed with a simple solution to parental backache - a child's cot with a rising base!

Other projects on offer during the day included:

• Does heavy metal music affect a person's IQ?

• The Placebo Effect

• Designing a heated riding boot

• What's lurking in your make-up?

• It will blow you away - wind turbines

• The effect of acid rain on germination

There is absolutely no doubt in mind that this sort of event encourages young people to take an active interest in science and to choose to study it at second and third level. If the enthusiasm for science on display last Friday is harnessed by the scientific community in Ireland, the future for science will be bright.

Science Snapshot Three: Castles in the Air

Science Week is ongoing in Ireland and continues until the 14th. For more details of events taking place around the country, you can visit here.


Here on Communicate Science, for the duration of Science Week, along with our usual posts, we'll be posting a 'Science Snapshot' every day. If you have a Science Snapshot you'd like to share, you can email here and we'll post the best later in the week.

The next picture is a shot of Blackrock Castle in Cork City. A castle was built on the site first around 1600 at the behest of Queen Elizabeth 1 who suggested it would "repel pirates and other invaders" from the City of Cork.

The original castle was destroyed in 1827 by fire and it was rebuilt (as it currently stands) by 1829. The castle came into public hands in 2001 when Cork City Council purchased it.

It now houses Ireland's first fully interactive astronomy centre and a team of astronomical researchers from Cork Institute of Technology.

The castle and astronomy centre is open to the public and has picked up a number of awards for its exhibitions.