Daily Image
03-08-2018
ASTRON in Noord-Brabant?
| Submitter: | Michel Arts |
| Description: | In the beginning of the 1950's the board of the Netherlands Foundation for Radio Astronomy (NFRA, the forerunner of ASTRON) was looking for a site for its planned 25 meter radio telescope. The first radio observatory of the NFRA was established at the site of Radio Kootwijk near Apeldoorn where a Würzburg-Riese radar dish was used for the first observations (see also this daily image). Using this dish the first radio map of the Milky Way was made. The diameter of the Würzburg-Riese dish was 7.5 meter. To make more detailed observations with increased sensitivity, the NFRA had plans to build a large radio telescope with a diameter of 25 meter. The search for a place to build the radio telescope was not easy. It should be far away from existing and planned highways, industrial areas and other possible sources of interference. One of the possible places was a site south of Eindhoven in the province of Noord-Brabant. The possible site in Noord-Brabant was mentioned in the booklet "Kootwijk hoort de Zon" (Kootwijk hears the sun) published in 1952. This booklet is part of the AO-series. In this series two other booklets about radio astronomy were published. The first one is "Radiostralen uit de sterrenwereld" (Radio rays from the world of stars) written by J. J. Raimond (the father of former ASTRON collegue Ernst Raimond) in 1946. The other one is "Hier... Radio-Melkweg!" (Here... Radio-Milky Way) published in 1956 just before the opening of the Dwingeloo radio telescope (see also this daily image). Another mention of the possible site in Noord-Brabant was made by the newspaper Algemeen Dagblad on the 27th of March 1953. In that article the radio observatory was caled a Mily Way monitoring station ("Melkweg-luisterpost"). Later in 1953 Dwingeloo was chosen as the definite site for the new radio telescope. One can speculate what the consequences would be if ASTRON was situated near the region of Eindhoven with a lot of high tech companies. At least it would mean less travelling for the current chairman of CAMRAS. |
| Copyright: | Koninklijke Bibliotheek (Delpher), ProfielActueel |
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