Advancing astrophysics with the square kilometre array

Abstract

The Square Kilometre Array concept has grown from the answer to a simple question: What size radio telescope would it take to permit us to read the history of the Universe as written in the language of its most abundant constituent, Hydrogen What has also become apparent, is that the same radio telescope that will answer fundamental questions about our cosmic origins and fate will permit a wealth of other discoveries to be made, in areas as diverse as the formation of planets similar to the Earth, detection of gravitational distortions of Space-Time, the origin of cosmic magnetic fields and understanding the formation and growth of Black Holes. In this paper we discuss a few of these headline science topics and refer the reader to the overview chapters within these proceedings for more details on the broad areas of anticipated impact, as well as the individual contributed chapters that focus on specific topics.