2 - Radio Emission from the Sun and Stars

Summary

Intense bursts of solar radio emission were first recognized by Second World War British and Australian coastal radar systems as well as by German and Japanese radar systems. Due to wartime security, these discoveries were not declassified until after the end of hostilities but, before declassification, Grote Reber, working alone in his mother’s backyard, reported receiving surprising strong radio emission from the Sun, well in excess of the expected emission from the 5,000 K solar surface. In 1946, while demonstrating his equipment to government representatives, Reber rediscovered solar radio storms when his chart recorder went off scale. Following World War II, with rapidly improving instrumentation, the Sun became a major target in the emerging field of radio astronomy. Observations with instruments of increasing sophistication have traced the complex time, frequency, and spatial dependence of the solar radio emission which corresponded to a wide variety of emission mechanisms. Later, following a false start due to using incorrect positions, radio emission was also detected from a variety of stars in our Galaxy, opening up the new field of stellar radio astronomy.