Clusters of galaxies are the most massive bound structures in the Universe lying at the crossroads of the large-scale structure. In the nearby Universe they are dominated by massive galaxies with very low star formation rates, but in past they must have been forming stars at a prodigious rate. However, finding young proto-clusters in the distant Universe is difficult as typical search methods (e.g. X-ray surveys, Sunyaev-Zel’dovich effect) become much less sensitive. High redshift radio galaxies are known to lie in overdense, proto-cluster environments and to be beacons regions of extreme star formation. Scaling relations suggest that the most massive black holes (powering this radio emission) will be found in the most massive dark matter haloes. This project will take advantage of low-frequency radio surveys with the Murchison Widefield Array (MWA) and combine it with NASA’s mid-infrared WISE mission to find and characterise new distant, massive proto-clusters.
