Speaker
Description
The CTAO represents the next major step in TeV gamma-ray astronomy. CTAO is now under construction at two sites - a northern site at La Palma, Spain, and a southern site at Paranal, Chile. Together, the CTAO's North and South arrays will provide an order of magnitude improvement in performance beyond current instruments (like HESS and MAGIC) to unveil the gamma-ray sky like never before. Australia has vital roles in CTAO construction, contributing funding (ARC, NCRIS plus seven universities including Monash Uni.), hardware towards telescope cameras, and expertise in analysis software development. Australian CTAO Consortium members are actively working on challenges in astrophysics and astroparticle physics that CTAO aims to tackle. Such challenges include the origin of cosmic rays, relativistic flows, extreme transients, and the nature of dark matter. This talk will provide an update on the status of CTAO, and the various roles of Australian teams.
