South African Radio Astronomy Observatory

the south african radio astronomy observatory (sarao), a facility of the national research foundation, is responsible for managing all radio astronomy initiatives and facilities in south africa, including the meerkat radio telescope in the karoo, and the geodesy and vlbi activities at the hartrao facility. sarao also coordinates the african very long baseline interferometry network (avn) for the eight ska partner countries in africa, as well as south africa’s contribution to the infrastructure and engineering planning for the square kilometre array radio telescope. to maximise the return on south africa’s investment in radio astronomy, sarao is managing programmes to create capacity in radio astronomy science and engineering research, and the technical capacity required to support site operations.