European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - December 20, 1985, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Page 16 the stars and stripes Friday december 20, 1985 work begins on world s largest Telescope radio telescopes working As one Earth s rotation and use of High Speed computers allow integration of 10 separate receiving dishes into one vast Telescope with a effective diameter of 5,000 Miles. By William j. Broad new York times on a plateau in new Mexico s Mountain country astronomers have begun to build the world s biggest radio Telescope. Their goal is to construct an array of dish shaped antennas stretching 5,000 Miles across the United states and its territories. With this system whose Power of Resolution would be 1,000 times As great As that of any existing optical or radio Telescope astronomers Hope to solve some of the universe s most baffling mysteries. For instance Why do some galaxies shoot out enormous jets of Energy at nearly the Speed of Light speculation is that such galaxies May be torn at their cores by Black holes. Clearly thare a something incredibly violent going  said Peter Napier an official of the National radio astronomy Observatory who is helping oversee the design and construction of the vast network. The greatest payoff will be understanding what s happening at the Center of these Active radio  the system of 10 radio telescopes is scheduled to be completed in the Early 1990s at a Cost of $68 million. The dishes will be orchestrated from the new mexican plateau. All the Sites Are Remote in order to Cut Down on interference from television and radio stations automobiles and other sources of electromagnetic pollution. Scientists at the National radio astronomy Observatory say the network will be unparalleled in exploring the universe of the invisible which often holds the most fascinating secrets of All. They say the Star filled sky which often appears to be unchanging conveys a false impression. The Trua violence of in universe was revealed Only after astronomers developed sensors capable of secondary reflect tool primary reflector surface Tucson. Alii . M. Abray operations enter  widely spaced Anten Nas provide a Sharp signal left because local interference pal terns cancel each Othef out end Only the True Reading remains ii astronomers use a pair of antennas located near each other. The Sharpness of the signal is blurred by local interference patterns detecting celestial emanations far beyond the Range of human vision including Gamma rays. A rays and radio Waves. For example radio astronomers discovered in the late 1960s that the universe was populated with pulsars stars that often look Ordinary in optical telescopes but that fire bursts of radio Waves with extraordinary rapidity and precision the universe is popping All Over the place said Riccardo Giacconi head of the space science Telescope Institute at Johns Hopkins University. Violent processes Are now seen to be the Norm rather than the  today s huge radio telescopes can easily probe the hidden violence of the Milky Way the Sun s Galaxy of about 400 billion stars. But tracing enigmatic bursts from Distant galaxies requires radio telescopes that Are even bigger. The real Beauty of this project is that is will enable us to watch things happen Over time said Robert l. Brown associate director of the National radio astronomy Observatory. Ii matter is flowing out of these galaxies at the Speed of Light and your Resolution is a thousand Light years nothing happens in your lifetime. But it the Resolution is one Light year you can watch things happen. This will greatly extend our dynamic  the network under construction is known As the very Long Baseline array or Elba. It will resemble the existing very Large array or Vla. Whose 27 antennas Are spread across a Small Patch of new mexican desert. Each of the Vla s dishes measures 82 feet in diameter and weighs 235 tons. Their output when combined by a supercomputer creates a radio Telescope with an effective diameter of 21 Miles. The Elba will use a similar technique but its 82-loot dishes will be spread out across the hemisphere creating a radio Telescope with an effective diameter of 5,000 Miles. Antennas Are to a in new Mexico with two site Hawaii Ca Lornia Washington Arizona Texas Iowa Massachusetts and the Virgin islands. We re basically doing what a big single dish would do if we Couk Nake it As Large As we  said Napier. Construction has begun on some of the system s electrical components he said. Groundbreaking Lor the first Antenna site is sub ruled for this month or Early next year.  such As the Elba Are so much bigger than optical ones because of Large differences in the size of electromagnetic Waves. Light Waves Are very compact Only a few Hundred thousandths of an inc Long. The lenses and mirrors of optical telescopes Are huge in comparison with these Waves. Thus even a six Inch reflecting Telescope is big enough to resolve the reflected Light of Distant planets. But radio Waves Are thousands of times larger than Waves of visible Light. In order to resolve these wavelengths or to be Able to distinguish one from another the collecting apparatus has to be similarly Large. The world s largest is the 1,000-foot Behemoth in Arecibo puerto Rico which was made by shaping a wire mesh Over a natural bowl in the mountains. The Arecibo device pushes the physical limit of single dishes however and further gains in the Resolution of radio telescopes had to await the linkage of relatively Small dishes into networks. One of the first was the Vla competed in 1980. Later a committee of the National Academy of sciences decided an Ever bigger array was critically important Lor the rapid and effective Progress of astronomical research. Originally it was estimated that the Elba which is being financed by the National science foundation could be built in two years. But the . Budget deficit has resulted in the financing being stretched out Over half a decade or longer. In fiscal 1984 about $2 million was received for design work and in 1985 about $9 million was provided for the Start of construction