Wow@Home – Network of Amateur Radio Telescopes

(phl.upr.edu)

116 points | by visviva 7 hours ago

5 comments

  • mk_stjames 22 minutes ago
    The next step for a project like this would be to incorporate a better, perhaps bepsoke SDR device more focused on the astronomy to be performed as most small off the shelf RTLSDR dongles have pretty horrible frequency drift. The addition of a more stable local clock source, coupled with a GPSDO - GPS disciplined oscillator - would allow signals to be correlated in time across many stations and allow for some actual, albeit basic, interferometry / aperture synthesis.

    I think that is what is needed for some actual science to be done with this kind of hardware and community support - similar to the work done by amateurs hosting hardware to record sferics in the VLF bands that sync up over the internet to do lightning strike tracking.

  • explodes 2 hours ago
    This is so cool. As someone who used to run SETI@Home, this is exciting and I'll be doing what I can when they're ready for me.

    What is lacking, or I cannot find, yet, is steps for me to take or contribute.

  • ericye16 1 hour ago
    I would love to build something like this, but it looks like the project is not quite complete yet? And also I don't see anywhere on the page where I can sign up for updates.
  • dmos62 2 hours ago
    At the risk of retracting from the really cool project, I notice that a lot of highlighted phrases in a text is indicative of an LLM writer. Not that I have anything against that.
    • aspect0545 41 minutes ago
      That would also fit because the image on the top is very clearly AI generated. I find that quite off-putting to be honest.