Time-lapse Movies of Black Hole Jets (MOJAVE)

VLBA Science News

Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA)

The Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA) comprises ten radio telescopes spanning 5,351 miles. It's the world's largest, sharpest, dedicated telescope array. With an eye this sharp, you could be in Los Angeles and clearly read a street sign in New York City!

Astronomers use the continent-sized VLBA to zoom in on objects that shine brightly in radio waves, long-wavelength light that's well below infrared on the spectrum. They observe blazars, quasars, black holes, and stars in every stage of the stellar life cycle. They plot pulsars, exoplanets, and masers, and track asteroids and planets.

Witnessing Life Cycles in the Cosmos

Using the VLBA as one of the world's most powerful radio cameras, astronomers peer through the dark cores of glowing gas clouds and see the stars that make them tick. In time-lapse, the VLBA sees hearts of galaxies pulsing as their central supergiant black holes whip out quintillions of tons of charged gas every day. With the VLBA's super eye, astronomers:

Update theories of how supermassive black holes feed and grow
Hunt for planets around dwarf stars
Record detailed time-lapse movies of supercharged gas speeding out from around black holes and newly forming stars
Watch "space weather" and magnetism around other stars
Reveal the shifting shells of nearby baby stars and aging suns
Witness the expansion of supernovae explosions over many years

M87 HST to VLBA
Radio galaxy M87 with the Hubble Space Telescope, showing its massive jet. The VLBA can see 300 times farther into the galaxy to reveal the source of the jet: a supermassive black hole. (Credit: NASA and the Hubble Heritage Team; NRAO/AUI; Y.Y. Kovalev, MPIfR and ASC.)

Mapping the Universe

The VLBA is a critical tool for astronomy, where knowing distances is the basis for figuring out mass, makeup, and movement of cosmic objects. With the VLBA's unmatched pinpointing accuracy, astronomers:

Measure the spins and shapes of galaxies, including our Milky Way
Collect cosmological distances to measure Dark Energy in the Universe
Trace the movements of black holes and pulsars to learn their history and future
Predict if and when galaxies will collide, including the Andromeda Galaxy with our Milky Way
Provide most accurate distances to stars
Pinpoint the exact centers of planets in our Solar System
Develop the celestial reference grid used by other telescopes

Monitoring the Changing Earth

To determine their exact locations on Earth to within fractions of an inch, the VLBA telescopes observe very distant quasars. With the support of the US Naval Observatory, the VLBA telescopes then act like pins tacked to the Earth's crust; any movement of the crust shows up as a change in distances between the telescopes. With the exact ground positioning of the VLBA, scientists:

Help GPS services improve their accuracy
Monitor movements of the Earth's crust and learn how they reflect wind patterns and point to climate change

Tracking Near-Earth Asteroids

Radar facilities beam radio pulses on to nearby asteroids. The VLBA's telescopes collect the beams as they return to Earth, pinpointing an asteroid's location over time. The precise timing of reflections received by the VLBA telescopes reveals the asteroid's spin rate and direction and allows prediction of changes in its orbit. With the VLBA's timing accuracy, astronomers can:

Keep an eye on potentially devastating "killer" asteroids
Monitor those asteroids targeted for possible future human exploration

The VLBA: A Continent-Sized Telescope

10 dish-shaped radio telescopes
Each is 82 feet (25 meters) across and weighs 240 tons
Spans 5,351 miles (8,611 km) from Hawai'i to the U.S. Virgin Islands
Remotely controlled from the NRAO Domenici Science Operations Center in New Mexico
Uses world-class, super-sensitive, cryogenic receivers
Uses masers to time-code data packs at each site for accurate correlation
Becomes the heart of the High Sensitivity Array when it teams with Arecibo, Effelsberg, and our Green Bank Telescope and Very Large Array
Construction started in February 1986
First observation with all 10 telescopes on May 29, 1993
Now up to 5000x better than the 1993 VLBA, thanks to new receivers and supercomputer installed in 2010

VLBA Realtime Photos

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Mauna Kea, Hawai'i	Owens Valley, California	Brewster, Washington
Kitt Peak, Arizona	Pie Town, New Mexico	Fort Davis, Texas
Los Alamos, New Mexico	North Liberty, Iowa	Hancock, New Hampshire
St. Croix, Virgin Islands