The Deep Synoptic Array

The 2000-antenna Deep Synoptic Array (DSA-2000) is a proposed world-leading radio survey telescope and multimessenger discovery engine, with first light anticipated in 2026. The array will consist of 2000 x 5m dishes distributed over a 15km diameter area in Nevada, operating in the 0.7 - 2 GHz frequency range. The DSA-2000 is enabled by ground-breaking ambient-temperature receivers and a low-cost antenna platform, building on established technology demonstrated via the precursor arrays (the DSA-10 and the NSF-funded DSA-110). With near complete sampling of the uv-plane, the DSA-2000 will replace a traditional correlator backend with a 'radio camera', an integrated correlator and gridding/imaging back-end that will produce the final image data in real-time. The algorithm and software development necessary for this paradigm shift has commenced, funded by Schmidt Futures (The Radio Camera Initiative).

In a five-year prime phase, the DSA-2000 will image the entire viewable sky (~30,000 deg²) repeatedly over sixteen epochs, detecting > 1 billion radio sources in a combined full-Stokes sky map with 500 nJy/beam rms noise. Continuum survey data will trace star-formation and accretion to the epoch of reionization, uniquely unaffected by dust obscuration, and will provide a new window on stellar activity and compact objects in our own Galaxy. The array will revolutionize the field of radio transients, with >10⁵ detections per epoch, with accompanying 12-point spectre-photometry, and excellent localization for multiwavelength cross-matching. High-spectral resolution (24 kHz; ~5 km/s at 1.4 GHz) all-sky and deep field image cubes will enable resolved HI kinematics and morphologies for galaxies (including the Milky Way) out to redshift ~0.5, tracing the role of gas inflow in star formation, and probing the gaseous interface between galaxies and the IGM. The array is intended as a cornerstone for multi-messenger science. 25% of the observing time will be dedicated to timing observations of up to 200 millisecond pulsars for the detection/characterization of nano-Hertz gravitational waves from binary supermassive black holes. 5% of DSA-2000 observations will involve searching for and monitoring radio afterglows of compact object mergers detected by LIGO,Virgo, KAGRA and LIGO-lndia. The array will simultaneously detect and localize ~10³ - 10⁴ FRBs each year, realizing their ultimate use as cosmological tool.