Scientific Rationale

This workshop on Deep Field Imaging is organised by Cavendish Astrophysics and is part of the Marie Curie Conferences and Training Courses on the Square Kilometre Array Design Studies (MCCT SKADS.) The aim of the EU MCCT programme is to promote, discuss and disseminate SKA and SKADS ideas to young researchers in order to provide the next generation of European astronomers with basic and advanced scientific and technology knowledge.

Aim:

The next generation of radio telescopes and in particular the SKA will provide unprecedented sensitivity and the potential for very deep imaging.  This workshop will discuss the new science that these very deep observations will make possible as well as the data processing challenges that will have to be met to fully exploit the instruments.  Although the focus of the workshop is on the SKA, there will also be discussion of the discovery-space opened up by instruments in the near future such as LOFAR, eMERLIN, the eVLA and EVN.  The scientific programme will be structured around the key science of the SKA and the problems and possible solutions to achieving the very high dynamic range needed to fully exploit the sensitivity of the SKA.  The topics that will be covered include:

• Probing the dark ages
• Galaxy evolution and cosmology
• The origin of cosmic magnetism
• Testing theories of gravity
• Challenges for reducing deep imaging observations

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