Lunar Crater Radio Telescope - LCRT

[Shpaget]

https://www.nasa.gov/directorates/spacetech/niac/2020_Phase_I_Phase_II/lunar_crater_radio_telescope/

That's interesting! Of course, being positioned on the far side of the Moon, it would be in the best possible position for a radio telescope, but there are a few issues I see. Wavelengths that a radio telescope can see depend on the size of holes in the wire mesh for the reflector, which might be a problem if you want to see the wavelength of 10 m, since the mesh should not be bigger than about 1 m. That means a lot of wire to fill up a 1 km diameter dish. While transporting that to the Moon may be trivial with the upcoming SpaceX hardware, pulling the mesh over a 3 km wire crater would be a decent engineering exercise even on Earth where you have as many cranes and trucks as you need.

 

May I propose a better name, one in line with the usual forced acronym NASA naming scheme?
LUCRATIVE - Lunar Crater Radio Telescope Is Viewing Extraterrestrials

Edited April 15, 2020 by Shpaget

[Scotius]

Wouldn't it be simpler to put a giant dish in high orbit? Or one of Lagrange points? In microgravity it could be as big as you can make it, and even moveable (very, veeeerrryyyyyy slllloooooowwwwwlllllllllyyyyyyyyyy).

[Shpaget]

The idea is to have a big chunk of rock between the antenna and the Earth, since Earth emits huge amounts of nasty radio noise.

[kerbiloid]

They can mount it out of sticks, like the Mir or ISS trusses, and deliver them in any space boxcar.

Though can't get why do they need the Moon rather than put it, say, in Lagrange point.
Got it. The waves absorbtion.

https://ppt-online.org/150222

Edited April 15, 2020 by kerbiloid

[K^2]

On 4/14/2020 at 11:39 PM, Shpaget said:

May I propose a better name, one in line with the usual forced acronym NASA naming scheme?

It's not just NASA. I think this is a common trope of experimental physics. You should see what particle physicists and cosmologists come up with. It's sufficient to point out that two (arguably) best candidates for dark matter have been known as WIMPs and MACHOs. If you didn't know otherwise, you'd probably think these came out of Marvel comic books. It's almost as if nerds who went into hard sciences grew up reading these, or something. 

[Scotius]

I suppose one has to occupy the mind somehow, while computers grind the data

[kerbiloid]

Luneye, from lunar + eye.

[tater]

From the OP link:

[RuBisCO]

Just imagine trying to deploy something like this in KSP.

[kerbiloid]

If cover with tent, it can be a market.

[Scotius]

4 hours ago, RuBisCO said:

Just imagine trying to deploy something like this in KSP.

Do you want to get visited by Kraken? Because this is a surefire way to summon Him...

[RuBisCO]

34 minutes ago, Scotius said:

Do you want to get visited by Kraken? Because this is a surefire way to summon Him...

I have had plenty of encounters with the Kraken, tis but a scratch! 

[Nuke]

the moon (or any low grav no atmo rock in the system) is a great place to put astronomical observation equipment. especially with the area around the planet cluttered with com sats. and the saturation satting that starlink is doing is bad for optical scopes. so not only for radio but optical scopes as well. kind of think any moon base should also come with an observatory.

Edited April 17, 2020 by Nuke