Allen Telescope Array

The Allen Telescope Array (ATA), formerly known as the One Hectare Telescope (1hT), was a joint effort by the SETI Institute and the Radio Astronomy Laboratory (RAL) at the University of California, Berkeley to construct a radio interferometer that is dedicated to astronomical observations and a simultaneous search for extraterrestrial intelligence. UC Berkeley completed divestment from the project in April 2012 and the facility is now managed by SRI International, an independent, nonprofit research institute.

The ATA is under construction at the Hat Creek Radio Observatory, 290 miles (470 km) northeast of San Francisco, California. When completed, the array is expected to consist of 350 antennas. The first phase with 42 antennas (ATA-42) is complete and became operational on 11 October 2007. However, in April 2011, the ATA was placed in operational hibernation due to funding shortfalls. In August 2011, short-term funding was found, and operation of the ATA was resumed on December 5, 2011.

Read more about Allen Telescope Array:  Background, Overview, Status, Key Science Goals, Opportunistic Science, Instrument Details

Famous quotes containing the words allen, telescope and/or array:

    White man tells me—hunh—
    Damn yo’ soul;
    White man tells me—hunh—
    Damn yo’ soul;
    Got no need, bebby,
    To be tole.
    —Sterling Allen Brown (b. 1901)

    The telescope at one end of his beat,
    And at the other end the microscope....
    Robert Frost (1874–1963)

    Any one who knows what the worth of family affection is among the lower classes, and who has seen the array of little portraits stuck over a labourer’s fireplace ... will perhaps feel with me that in counteracting the tendencies, social and industrial, which every day are sapping the healthier family affections, the sixpenny photograph is doing more for the poor than all the philanthropists in the world.
    Macmillan’s Magazine (London, September 1871)