The
observatory was founded by Arthur Covington who directed the Observatory
until 1978. Covington was also responsible for the expansion of the site
and the construction of the 46m antenna. Operating at radio
frequency, the giant parabolic dish focuses electromagnetic radiation
towards the focus cabin mounted on four legs above the surface. The
efficiency gained by the large reflecting surface enables the telescope to
receive signals from Mars and to determine precisely the location of the
telescope with respect to Pulsars in neighboring star systems. The construction and
operation of the observatory was reported in Solar
Physics by Arthur Covington in 1969.
Historical
Highlights
ARO
was the first telescope system to demonstrate Very Long Baseline
Interferometry (VLBI) a technique that surpasses the accuracy of GPS and
now enables the measurement of phenomena such as continental drift. The
team comprised the National Research Council of Canada, Dominion Radio Astronomical
Observatory, Penticton, the University of Toronto and Queen's
University. The
technique was reported by N. W. Broten in the Journal Science
in 1967. The team was awarded the Rumford Medal for their achievement.
Observations reported in Nature by Andrew
and Purton provided an upper limit for the radio emission of
supernova Delphini 1967. The telescope was used to observe
emission lines from large molecules including HC5N, HC7N, HC9N and
HC11N. This work is credited with the discovery
of cyanodiacetylene in the interstaller medium. The observatory was
also utilised to study the emissions of H2O, HN3
and OH in the gaseous nebulae in the milky way and other galaxies. Other
work included the study of planetary nebulae, the black hole source Cyg
X-1, pulsar 0329+54, the Sun, variable extra-galactic sources including
B1 Lac, and the development of a database of 2.8 cm flux measurements
for a wide range of objects.
Wikipedia provides further historical
accounts of the Observatory's activities. The antenna is currently
used for pulsar research, space tracking and Deep Space Network
communications. The antenna recently hosted York University's space
engineering field school for students in their final year of a BaSc
in Space Engineering. Students developed and executed tracking
software to point the antenna and also helped in the revitalization
project.
