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Tourism is Compromising the World's Largest Telescope (wired.com)
Thousands of people moved to let China build and protect Five-Hundred-Meter Aperture Spherical Radio Telescope (FAST), the world's largest telescope. And then the government drew in orders of magnitude more tourists, potentially undercutting its own science in an attempt to promote it. An excerpt: During the four-day Radio Astronomy Forum, Stierwalt and the other astronomers did, finally, get to see the actual telescope, taking a bus up a tight, tortuous road through the karst between town and telescope. As soon as they arrived on site, they were instructed to shut down their phones to protect the instrument from the radio frequency interference. But not even these astronomers, who want pristine FAST data for themselves, could resist pressing that capture button. "Our sweet, sweet tour guide continually reminded us to please turn off our phones," says Stierwalt, "but we all kept taking pictures and sneaking them out because no one really seemed to care." Come on: It's the world's largest telescope.
Maybe their minder stayed lax because a burst here or there wouldn't make much of a difference in those early days. The number of regular tourists allowed at the site all day is capped at 3,000, to limit RFI, and they have to put their phones in lockers before they go see the dish. Krco says the site bumps up against the visitor limit most days. But tourism and development are complicated for a sensitive scientific instrument. Within three miles of the telescope, the government passed legislation establishing a "radio-quiet zone," where RFI-emitting devices are severely restricted. No one (not cellular providers or radio broadcasters) can get a transmitting license, and people entering the facility itself will have their electronics confiscated.
Maybe their minder stayed lax because a burst here or there wouldn't make much of a difference in those early days. The number of regular tourists allowed at the site all day is capped at 3,000, to limit RFI, and they have to put their phones in lockers before they go see the dish. Krco says the site bumps up against the visitor limit most days. But tourism and development are complicated for a sensitive scientific instrument. Within three miles of the telescope, the government passed legislation establishing a "radio-quiet zone," where RFI-emitting devices are severely restricted. No one (not cellular providers or radio broadcasters) can get a transmitting license, and people entering the facility itself will have their electronics confiscated.
Aren't these tourists using telescope mode on their phones?
Nof if it wants to capture alien WiFi.
bickerdyke
Thousands of people moved to let China build and protect Five-Hundred-Meter Aperture Spherical Radio Telescope
Orly?!?!? People in China moved because they are very nice and wanted to help out the government??!?!
BWHAHAHAHAHAHA
Now let's look at an actual quote from TFA (yeah, I know .. I actually read it. And emphasis is mine)
The country even forcibly relocated thousands of villagers who lived nearby, so their modern trappings wouldn’t interfere with the new prized instrument.
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This would never happen in the US because of the Second Amendment. Can you imagine what would happen if the US government seized private land for a public project? Why, there would be so many people exercising their Second Amendment rights they would never even try! That is what our Founded Famers meant when they created the Second Amendment!
Unless you have missed a /s from your comment it sounds like you have never heard of Eminent Domain https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
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While turning a cellphone into airplane mode probably solves the problem for 90%, the digital electronics inside a cellphone that is turned on still cause some RFI. That's why for most radio quiet zones, electronic devices that need to enter the radio quiet zones are carefully tested / selected before bringing them on site.
In an authoritarian state, that could forcibly relocate thousands to build the telescope, decides it wants to actually do science, as opposed to promoting its project, it can impose the effective EM silence that is needed. Simply enforce the existing no-electronics zone, collecting all non-conforming electronics at the zone edge. I am sure they can offer "selfie services" at the telescope for a price, downloadable at home. This is an easy fix for them.
Starships were meant to fly, Hands up and touch the sky - Nicky Minaj
Plus: You'd think the siftware largest telescope in the world could filter out 3.5GHz during the daytime.
So, scientists should just not observe the CH bond in molecular clouds, which has spectral lines at 3.4 GHZ because tourists want to gab on their phones?
This assumes that all of the phones that tourists carry are precisely engineered to not emit any signals at all outside of their assigned band, an assumption that is known to be wrong. And it assumes that none of the tourists have multi-mode phones that are emitting at the wrong frequency. We are talking consumer electronics of every variety and quality and (mis)configuration here. Radio telescopes are extremely sensitive, any signal leakage is liable to interfere.
Not sure why you specify "daytime". You know radio telescopes work in the day, right? And that if the object being observed in the sky is only above the horizon in daytime, that they have no choice but to observe it then, right?
Starships were meant to fly, Hands up and touch the sky - Nicky Minaj
The phrase "Farming Famers" and over-the-top rhetoric makes it clear he's a Troll. Do not feed the Troll.
Did you know that the in-flight regulations governing cellphones are FCC rules, not FAA rules?
(fast-moving cellphones at high altitude cause havoc in the cell-tower system)
The rules also help prevent air-rage so the airlines don't fight them too hard. The last thing people want is some loud-mouth yakking next to them the whole time.
No sig today...
This would never happen in the US because of the Second Amendment.
No, this would never happen in the US because someone would declare the site 'sacred' or claim that the project emits radiation of some kind. We don't do science any more, which is why we have to be tourists in China if we want to visit some research.
Lots of countries force people to move so that they can build what they want
I don't know, but I would really worry about the electromagnetic intereference when that capacitor discharges through that floodlight.
There are two ways to build a radio telescope. One is to maximize its size by creating an interferometer. This is done by mounting two or more radio dishes as far apart as possible, then synchronizing the signals they receive. That gives you the resolving power of a radio dish as large as the separation of the dishes. In other words, you get a radio telescope able to resolve extremely fine detail at radio wavelengths.
The other is to maximize surface area. A circle actually has the smallest diameter for a given area, so this gives you the minimum resolving power. But the large surface area maximizes sensitivity - it can pick out especially faint signals. So for this radio telescope to effectively leverage its strength, its surroundings need to be very quiet at radio frequencies.
If only we had a ginormous fusion reactor casting light on if, but far enough away - say 93M miles or so.