Society of Amateur Radio Astronomers

Highest ever attendance levels and two Nobel laureate speakers helped make SARA 2014 the best ever gathering of amateur and professional radio astronomers. On June 29, 2014 the Society of Amateur Radio Astronomers (SARA) gathered at the National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO) for its annual conference. Counting the Radio Jove part of the week, it was also the longest gathering. As one young enthusiast noted, “SARA is hot.”

Palo Alto, California, USA on 20 - 22 March 2015

The 2015 SARA Western Regional Conference will be held at Stanford University in Palo Alto, California on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, 20 - 22 March 2015.  The meeting will include a visit the Institute for Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology (KIPAC).

Call for papers: Papers are welcome on subjects directly related to radio astronomy including hardware, software, education and tutorials, research strategies, observations and data collection and philosophy. If you wish to present a paper please email a letter of intent, including a proposed title and abstract to the conference coordinator at westernconference@radio-astronomy.org no later than 31 December 2014.

On April 26-27, the 3rd Annual USA Science and Engineering Festival took over the Walter E. Washington Convention Center in Washington, D.C. Over 325,000 people came out to celebrate discovery and innovation through over 3,000 hands-on activities and 150 performances and lectures. Sneak Peek Friday alone (Apr 25) included more than 40,000 students, teachers, military families, government officials and press.

John Cromwell Mather PHD, 2006 Nobel Laureate in Physics, will visit NRAO on June 30, and will give a talk that afternoon.  SARA is delighted that Dr. Mather will be speaking during the SARA conference and the SARA attendees will attend.  Dr. Mather is an American astrophysicist, cosmologist and Nobel Prize in Physics laureate for his work on the Cosmic Background Explorer Satellite (COBE) with George Smoot.