Good news has been coming out of South Africa that is of
interest to the astronomical community. Recently, astronomers
there have demonstrated that they, too, can link together widely
separated telescopes to effectively make one huge radio
telescope, among other advances in their bid to host the world’s
next premier radio observatory. Radio astronomers have long
dreamed of an telescope that would have incredibly good
sensitivity by having a large collecting area. In fact, a square
kilometer of such was selected as a goal, and the SKA, or Square
Kilometer Array, was conceived. Dreams turned into proposals
over the last several years, and two countries are now vying to
host the SKA in the form of large arrays of dish-like or
antenna-like radio telescopes. Simulation of what one component
of the SKA may look like when completed. Australia and South
Africa both have excellent sites far away from human
civilization and all of its cell phones and cars that could
interfere with faint cosmic signals. I’ve become more