Goldstone Apple Valley Radio Telescope (GAVRT) Solar Patrol

The Goldstone Apple Valley Radio Telescope (GAVRT) is located in Goldstone, California. It is a reconfigured antenna used for teaching purposes.

The GAVRT program teaches K-12 students how to calibrate this 34-meter antenna (known as Deep Space Station-28), collect and distribute science data through the Internet and get excited about radio astronomy. Students collaborate with scientists who are working on the same mission and are recognized as part of the science team. Data collected and analyzed by the students is used by NASA in their studies of the solar system.

During the April 8, 2024, total solar eclipse, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, educators at the Lewis Center for Education Research in Southern California, and participants in the center’s Solar Patrol citizen science program will observe solar “active regions” – the magnetically complex regions that form over sunspots – as the Moon moves over them. The Moon’s gradual passage across the Sun blocks different portions of the active region at different times, allowing scientists to distinguish light signals coming from one portion versus another. The technique, first used during the May 2012 annular eclipse, revealed details on the Sun the telescope couldn’t otherwise detect.