The whole-earth array ‒ Developments in very-long-baseline interferometry

Abstract

Radio astronomers, in common with many others who work with radio antennas, have always felt rather handicapped by the basic physical relationship between the size of an antenna (measured in wavelengths) and its resolving power (or beamwidth): ΔΘ ~ λ/D, where ΔΘ is the beamwidth in radians, λ the wavelength and D the diameter of the aperture. The largest fully-steerable antennas used as radio telescopes have dimensions of at most a few thousand times their minimum useable wavelength; as a result the beamwidth of such instruments, and hence the angular resolving power, is at best a few minutes of arc.

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