A New Era in Radio Astronomy

Abstract

By the early 1950s the US Department of Defense, especially the Navy, and the newly created National Science Foundation (NSF) began to play a major role in American science, especially in astronomy. Meanwhile, Associated Universities, Inc. (AUI), which founded and operated the Brookhaven National Laboratory, was looking for new business. During these Cold War times, the United States could not afford to fall behind in the exciting and rapidly developing new area of radio astronomy. Caltech, MIT, Harvard, and Naval Research Laboratory scientists discussed how to get the United States more involved in this emerging field that had clear commercial and military applications as well as extraordinary opportunities for basic research. Two key conferences held at the end of 1953 and the start of 1954 provided the catalyst for an NSF-funded feasibility study aimed toward the goal of establishing a national radio astronomy facility.