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Radio Telescopes in Orbit

-- Martin | December 12, 2019

Question:

Hello,

Theoretically, if you wanted to put a satellite with an antenna in space for radio astronomy, how large would the antenna have to be to get usable data. Also would you be restricted to using a parabolic antenna? If not could you use a modified yagi antenna design in order to save on space?

-- Martin

Answer:

In fact, we have already put a number of radio telescopes into space designed to do a wide array of scientific studies. One such observatory is NASA’s Space Very Long Baseline Interferometry network, which performs very high spatial resolution radio wavelength measurements using a number of orbiting radio telescopes. Two other radio telescopes in orbit, HALCA and Spektr-R, have performed a variety of radio astronomical measurements to-date.

-- Jeff Mangum

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