$3 million grant will expand Skynet telescope network, featuring Green Bank Observatory’s 20-meter telescope

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Green Bank Observatory’s 20-meter telescope is a fundamental instrument in Skynet.

A proposal submitted by an international team, led by professor Dan Reichart in the department of physics and astronomy of the University of North Carolina, has been selected to receive a $3 million grant from the Department of Defense’s National Defense Education Program (NDEP).

Reichart directs “Skynet,” which is a globally distributed network of fully automated or robotic telescopes, developed by his team at UNC-Chapel Hill. Skynet currently numbers approximately 20 visible-light telescopes, spanning four continents and five countries, and one significantly larger radio telescope (pictured) at Green Bank Observatory in West Virginia.

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Astronomers Looked For Alien Civilization In Our Closest 1,300 Stars. Here’s What They Found

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Photo credit Jee Seymour

The truth is out there, they say, but we haven’t come close to finding it yet. The Breakthrough Listen project has searched the closest 1,327 stars in our galaxy for hints of intelligent life and advanced civilizations.

This extensive data was gathered using two of the world’s most powerful ground telescopes, the Green Bank Telescope and the Parkes Telescope in New South Wales, Australia.

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Wild, Wonderful, and Radio Quiet

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“Tucked away amidst the rolling Allegheny Mountains, Green Bank is home to one of the world’s premier astronomical observatories. There, radio telescopes tune in to the whispers of the universe, night and day. It’s a place unlike any other on Earth.”

Highland Outdoors magazine shared a fantastic article about the Observatory.

Read it here!