Society, Government,
and Radio Astronomy in America
and Elsewhere
Bernard F. Burke, MIT
Leiden, 11 June, 2013
Discussions with George
What you freely assert, I freely deny
Defend yourself
Understand the difference between assertion
and demonstration
The Way Science Works
• Often starts with assertion
• Usually implemented by order-of-magnitude
calculations and incomplete demontration
• Understanding of demonstrations to be made
• Ability to translate concept into practice
What Astronomy Needs
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Educated Talent and Money!
Talent comes from the Universities
Where does the money come from?
The Public!
Where do the scientific ideas come from?
How do greet telescopes get built?
The Structural Support
Society > Government; Science on boundary
The Community of Science
Formerly, private support
Since WW2, primarily the government
Support depends on the confidence of donors
In the Netherlands, Oort had that confidence
Confidence depends on communication
Beginnings
• Jansky > Grote Reber > Leiden (3 years late)
• Jan Oort > Henk van de Hulst (Shklovsky)
• Muller & Oort, Purcell & Ewen, Kerr &
Hindman
• The Dwingeloo 25-m Groote Spiegel
• The Benelux Cross
The New Era
• In 1962, Martin Ryle properly formulates
aperture synthesis.
• Elements: earth rotation, modern computers, fast
Fourier transform
• Recognition that, for an array of small elements,
aperture synthsis could map the sky within the
primary beam in the same time that a single dish
with diameter equal to the maximum baseline
would take.
• Except for the FFT, all the basic elements were
well-known!
Oort Acts
• Benelux gone!
• Westerbork Synthesis Array in!
• The project backing comes from all of the
Netherlands, but action was primarily at
Leiden.
• The design and construction is centered at
Leiden, with contributions from Groningen.
• Note: the dimension was one metric mile
Meanwhile, in America, …
• While the US lingered after WW2, England,
Netherlands, Australia, France, and Italy
forged ahead.
• A small group of American physicists and
astrophysicists started promoting its promise
to US funding agencies, led by Merle Tuve,
Bart Bok, and Jesse Greenstein.
The Washington Conference
• In January 1954, at the CIW, Tuve and
Greenstein organized a conference to review
radio astronomy.
• Ambitious radio observatories were founded.
• The groundwork was laid for a national radio
observatory, the NRAO.
• Green Bank Wva chosen, and 140-ft
construction begins
• A major break from the past!
The VLA
• After several years, when Dave Heeschen was the
shadow director, he became Director in 1962.
• The NRAO became increasingly oriented toward
interferometry
• In the late 1960’s, the outrigger of the 3-element
interferometer demonstrated the feasibility of
stable interferometry over a 40-km baseline.
• Heeschen formed a project. He was the leader.
• He set the basic spec: 1 arc-second at 21 cm.
The Greenstein Decadal Survey
• Al Whitford headed a survey to recommend
major initiatives in astronomy for the 1960’s
• A major contest arose between the NRAO,
MIT, and CalTech.
• The NRAO won.
Building the VLA
• Ground was broken in the Plains of St. Augustine
in 1972
• Estimated cost: $84 million, 1980 completion
• Completed on time, within budget!
• Not without problems; after 10 antennas had
been completed:
Congressman Boland said no more money
E-systems said no more antennas without
another $15 million
These are known as management challenges!
IRAM
• A 30-m mm-wave dish in Spain vs. a mm
interferometer on the Plateau de Bure
• Helpful intervention by the CNRF and MPG
• The Three Wise Men review the situation
• In a pleasant Paris restaurant, Paul Wild
invents IRAM.
The SKA
• Peter Wilkinson’s modest proposal: need for
an array with collecting area of a square km.
• The naïve working group—The Hague, 1994.
• Leiden, 1997: technically sophisticated, but
fiscally naïve
• Sydney 1997: Wim Brouw and I insert realism.
• First steps toward a formal organization
Progress toward the SKA
• Formation of the SKA Consortium, led by
Richard Schilizzi
• Consolidation under David Diamond
• Problem: Decadal Survey for 2010
• The continuing budget estimate problem
• The contining American absence problem
• Ken Kellermann: “The SKAn suffers from too
much democracy.”
ALMA
• The results achieved by the array at Hat Creek,
Owens Valley, and the Plateau de Bur, plus the
various mm-wave dishes of IRAM, NRAO, UK, and
CalTech generated a push for a large mm-wave
array at an optimum site.
• A bilateral arrangement was made betwee NRAO
and the ESO to manage ALMA construction at a
high site above San Pedro de Atacama in the high
Andes.
• The project has been successful, but is not
regarded as a management model.
Lessons Learned
• Evolution from university-based research to
institute-based research
• Curious problem of setting directions;
increasing role of central bureaucracy
• Vital role of strong central management