What is radio astronomy?
Radio waves were first detected from space in the 1930s but few scientists took the discovery seriously. The development of radar in the Second World War led to improvements in antennas and electronics. After the war many of the scientists involved started to use this equipment to investigate the radio signals coming from space. Australia was at the forefront of this work with scientists at CSIRO’s Radiophysics Laboratory making many important discoveries. The science of radio astronomy was born.
You can read this screen because your eyes detect light. Light consists of electromagnetic waves. The different colors of light are electromagnetic waves of different lengths. Visible light, however, covers only a small part of the range of wavelengths in which electromagnetic waves can be produced. Radio waves are electromagnetic waves of much greater wavelength than those of light. For centuries, astronomers learned about the sky by studying the light coming from astronomical objects, first by simply looking at the objects, and later by making photographs. Many astronomical objects emit radio waves, but that fact wasn’t discovered until 1932. Since then, astronomers have developed sophisticated systems that allow them to make pictures from the radio waves emitted by astronomical objects. A number of celestial objects emit more strongly at radio wavelengths than at those of light, so radio astronomy has produced many surprises in the last half-century. By studying the sky with both ra
Podcaster: Sue Ann Heatherly with Dr. Jay Lockman Organization: National Radio Astronomy Observatory Description: Sue Ann Heatherly from the National Radio Astronomy Observatory in Green Bank, West Virginia interviews astronomer Dr. Jay Lockman to answer some of the most common questions about radio astronomy. Transcript: SUE ANN HEATHERLY: Welcome to 365 Days of Astronomy. My name is Sue Ann Heatherly. I’m with the National Radio Astronomy Observatory in Green Bank, West Virginia. With me today is Dr. Jay Lockman, who is an astronomer with us here in Green Bank. We’re going to talk about some of the common questions people ask when they come to visit us. So, Jay, what is radio astronomy, anyway? DR. JAY LOCKMAN: Well, first of all, radio astronomy is astronomy. It’s about our attempt to understand the things that we see out in the universe. Everything from the sun to the moon, the planets, the stars, galaxies–even Earth itself. So, it’s astronomy fundamentally. What makes it differen
You can read this page because your eyes detect the light reflected from it. (If you are reading this information on a computer screen, on the other hand, your eyes are probably detecting light radiated by it.) Light consists of electromagnetic waves. The different colors of light are electromagnetic waves of different lengths. Visible light, however, covers only a small part of the range of wavelengths in which electromagnetic waves can be produced. Radio waves are electromagnetic waves of much greater wavelength than those of light. For centuries, astronomers learned about the sky by studying the light coming from astronomical objects, first by simply looking at the objects, and later my making photographs. Many astronomical objects emit radio waves, but that fact wasn’t discovered until 1932. Since then, astronomers have developed sophisticated systems that allow them to make pictures from the radio waves emitted by astronomical objects. A number of celestial objects emit more stron
