Online CAMRAS software defined radio 'meteor scatter' receiver.

© CAMRAS

Some visitors and ASTRON/JIVE co-workers may have wondered what the recently installed Yagi antennas next to the Dwingeloo Telescope are for. Those aerials are part of the CAMRAS 'Radio Garden' project which aims to make radio astronomy more accessible to a broad public. In a later stage, a 20.1 MHz 'radio JOVE' receiver and more will be added.

The current setup consists of two VHF antennas connected to the internet, via webSDR software designed by Pieter Tjerk de Boer(CAMRAS). Its aim is to receive meteor echoes from the french GRAVES space radar, and the belgian BRAMS meteor beacons located at Dourbes and Ieper. Besides meteor scatter, also airplanes, the International Space Station (ISS) and other satellites are visible. And occasionally the receiver even shows moon echoes of the GRAVES radar.

A more detailed description, and a manual for building your own meteor scatter station, including how to use the Spectrum Lab software, is on the KNVWS website: http://werkgroepmeteoren.nl/radio/

The screenshot above has captured a beautiful 'overdense' ionized meteor trail of a random or possible early Orionid meteor on October 4th last year. The receiver used by Frans de Jong(CAMRAS) is the forementioned webSDR at http://websdr.camras.nl:8901/ in conjunction with Spectrum Lab FFT software for analysis. At the time it was tuned to the frequency of the meteor beacon at Ieper(B).