On January 10, 1946, the U.S. army bounced radar signals off of Earth's moon for the first time ever.
Known as "Project Diana," this was the first experiment in radio astronomy. They set up a large transmitter, receiver and antenna at a laboratory in New Jersey and blasted short radio pulses in the direction of the moon. Then 2.5 seconds later, the reflected radio signals were detected. So it took 2.5 seconds for the radio waves to make the 477,000-mile round trip to and from the moon. With this successful experiment, Project Diana marked the birth of radio astronomy.
Known as "Project Diana," this was the first experiment in radio astronomy. They set up a large transmitter, receiver and antenna at a laboratory in New Jersey and blasted short radio pulses in the direction of the moon. Then 2.5 seconds later, the reflected radio signals were detected. So it took 2.5 seconds for the radio waves to make the 477,000-mile round trip to and from the moon. With this successful experiment, Project Diana marked the birth of radio astronomy.
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TechTranscript
00:00On this day, in space.
00:04On January 10th, 1946, the U.S. Army bounced radar signals off Earth's moon for the very
00:08first time.
00:10Known as Project Diana, this was the first experiment in radio astronomy.
00:14They set up a large transmitter, receiver, and antenna at a laboratory in New Jersey
00:17and blasted short radio pulses in the direction of the moon.
00:21Then 2.5 seconds later, the reflected radio signals were detected.
00:25This means it took 2.5 seconds for the radio waves to make the 477,000 mile round trip
00:30to and from the moon.
00:31With this successful experiment, Project Diana marked the birth of radio astronomy.
00:36And that's what happened on this day in space.