University of New Mexico Physics and Astronomy students contribute to building telescopes for new LWA station
November 16, 2023 - Dani Rae Wascher
University of New Mexico Department of Physics and Astronomy Distinguished Professor Greg Taylor recently took a group of students to build antennas at the third Long Wavelength Array (LWA) station. The LWA is a telescope that helps collect radio wave data from celestial bodies. The effort was part of a $1 million grant received by the department from the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL).
Taylor and the students traveled down to the North Arm site, located in central New Mexico about 25 km north of the first LWA station (LWA1) and the Very Large Array (VLA), to build these antennas. In collaboration, this new station being built will partner with the other two stations (LWA1 and LWA-SV) already built by this department in New Mexico to search for transient sources. While constructing these antennas students learned about radio astronomy instrumentation and signal analysis.
Along with students from UNM, Hillsdale College students also collaborated on this project and traveled from Michigan to gain hands-on experience with building the antennas. The ultimate goal for this project is for students to build these instruments in order to utilize them properly to discover something new about the universe.
Taylor points out that this new site, LWA-NA, operates at low frequencies, meaning they are using dipole arrays, which do not involve massive antennas. Dipoles can take a couple of students about half an hour to assemble the whole dipole antenna. Unlike the VLA’s antennas which weigh around 250 tons, students are able to easily assemble the dipole antenna based on their labor alone.
“That's the great thing about this project is that it is very approachable for students. They don't just build antennas, we get them involved in everything, even very advanced digital processing techniques, learning how to write the software, how to really understand the signals, how we're combining the signals and how we put it all together, and making images of the sky. They really get a terrific experience,” expressed Taylor.
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