As part of the decade-long upgrade to the Very Large Array, an enormous room inside the Control Building was shielded in copper and given a raised floor to begin installation of the VLA’s new supercomputer known as WIDAR (Wideband Interferometric Digital ARchitecture). It is a method for digital correlation of very wideband signals from a radio interferometer. Data are digitally filtered and tuned down by ten percent into lower rate sub-bands which are separately cross-correlated and integrated before being seamlessly stitched together to yield the final wideband spectrum.
Maintenance of a VLA Antenna
The 28 antennas at the Very Large Array (VLA) each take turns coming into the Antenna Assembly Building, or Barn, for routine maintenance. Telescope technicians carefully test and service these 230-ton telescopes.
Splitting a VLA Antenna in Half
Over time, the azimuth bearing of a Very Large Array antenna needs cleaning out and repairing. Here, technicians align the upper, dish half of the antenna on the dark platform that will support it after its base is pulled out from under it by the Transporter.
Half a VLA Antenna in the Barn
A rare look at an antenna of the Very Large Array under construction in the 1970s. The entire 25-meter dish is on the ground behind the pedestal in the Antenna Assembly Building in central New Mexico.
VLA Dish Dipped in the Barn
A rare view of a dipped 25-meter dish antenna of the Very Large Array undergoing maintenance inside the Antenna Assembly Building, also called the Barn. The VLA has 28 of these giant antennas, but only needs 27 for the array. Having a spare means maintenance can happen year-round without a loss of astronomy time.
Array Operations Center
The Array Operations Center sits on the campus of the New Mexico Institute of Technology. Here, staff support the science and technology for the Very Large Array (VLA) and the Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA).