MIT Moonbase to Search for 'Dark Age' of the Universe

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology has always been exclusive, but their latest project is higher-profile than most.  Recently unveiled plans aim at two square kilometers of the most exclusive land there is - the dark side of the moon.  They hope to erect an array of ultra-low wavelength radio telescopes to examine the mysteries of the early universe without being distracted by you and your stupid television. Seriously. 

One of the reasons for the ultra-isolated (and undeniably awesome) location is that the desired signals are interfered with by television transmissions which, in a stirring testament to human culture, you can't actually get away from anywhere on the globe. The other is the natural noise from Earth's ionosphere.

An easy way to insulate a receiver from both is to stick a small planetary body in the way - and lucky for us, we just happen to have one that we haven't been using for anything except marking calendars and as the finish line in a really, really expensive race. Even better, the moon's locked rotation (which means that the dark side is always facing away from the Earth) ensures the detectors will be permanently screened from unwanted episodes of Sex and the City. Once we actually get them there, that is.

Heaving a few hundred telescopes onto the lunar surface isn't a case of asking Superman if he has a few minutes on his lunchbreak - the researchers are currently working on a one year plan to come up with another, bigger plan about how the hell they're actually going to do it. This makes the whole thing slightly further removed from reality than a Jerry Springer guest's new years resolutions. On the upside, the final plan will involve robotic moon vehicles, so it'll be worth waiting for.

Estimates of the final project cost come in at around a billion dollars, so expect the MIT "Year of Planning" to be broken up into three objectives: a) How are we going to get the telescopes up there? b) How are we going to analyse the data? c) Seriously, how can we keep the accountant's head from exploding when we submit this expense estimate? On the upside, they aren't going to be stuck making precision adjustments so far from home that you literally can't see the place anymore.

The radio waves they're after come from the Dark Age of the universe, a period just after the Big Bang (cosmologically speaking) about thirteen billion years ago when the whole "Everything there is" deal was being built out of huge clouds of cold gas. And when ultra-long wavelength signals travel across literally All Of Time and Most of Space to get here, it turns out they're not too fussy about where the detectors are - once you've found somewhere free of interference, just plonk the things down and wait for the data.

The Lunar Array for Radio Cosmology (LARC) is headed by Professor Hewitt, most likely because Hugo Drax doesn't want to tip Bond off about his cover for assembling a new lunar base assembly plan until it's ready. At which point, just hours before succeeding in his plan to wipe out all life on Earth, he'll probably invite the guy up and refuse to kill him about five times. Rumours of a tall metal-toothed man on the MIT astronomy staff are unfounded. Lunar telescope base: LARC Project is no joke.

Posted by Luke McKinney.

Related Galaxy posts:

Our Lunar Moon -A Rarity in the Cosmos
Japan's SELENE Captures Earth Rise at the Lunar North Pole
Moon-Base Architects Plan 1st Step in Exploring the Cosmos –A Daily Galaxy Interview

Link:

http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2008/moonscope-0215.html

Comments

[zoltan galantai]

the Moon doesn't have a "dark side":
"As the Moon orbits the Earth, different parts of it get illuminated by the Sun."
http://www.badastronomy.com/bad/misc/dark_side.html