Listening to the Cosmos | Secrets of the Very Large Array | The Psalm 19 Project

Summary

Podcast Summary: Prophecy Watchers

Episode: Listening to the Cosmos | Secrets of the Very Large Array | The Psalm 19 Project

Date: March 9, 2026
Hosts: Mondo Gonzales (Psalm 19 Project)
Guest: Montana Williams (Senior Education Officer, VLA)

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Main Theme

The episode dives into the science behind the Very Large Array (VLA) in New Mexico, exploring how radio astronomy has expanded our understanding of the cosmos. Mondo Gonzales and Montana Williams discuss the technological marvels of the VLA, its historical discoveries, how radio telescopes differ from traditional ones, and previews of next-generation telescopic arrays. The conversation also touches on the interplay between science and faith through the lens of Psalm 19’s theme: the heavens declaring the glory of God.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Introduction to the VLA

[00:05–00:39]

• Montana Williams describes her role as Senior Education Officer, leading public outreach and education at the VLA.
• The VLA consists of 28 antennas (27 operational in a movable “Y” configuration) spanning diameters from 0.6 to 22 miles. The configuration allows for varying resolution and sensitivity.

2. How Radio Telescopes Work

[00:42–03:10]

• Unlike optical telescopes, radio telescopes record electromagnetic signals as voltages, mapping invisible energy across the sky.
• The data is translated into visual representations by assigning colors to varying intensities of radio waves.
• “Even actually a lot of cameras like James Webb and other telescopes, they record the same thing we do.… they essentially record a voltage, but they sort of record that energy.” – Montana Williams [02:39]

3. Key Discoveries and Importance of the VLA

[03:10–04:37]

• The VLA helped discover water ice on Mercury and the first Einstein ring (a gravitational lensing phenomenon).
• Major contributions include studying star formation, planetary systems, galaxy dynamics, and particularly active galactic nuclei (supermassive black holes).
• "We were the first ones to discover the first Einstein ring.” – Montana Williams [03:32]

4. Combining Signals: Why So Big?

[04:10–05:15]

• The array’s size is necessary to achieve finer resolution given the long wavelengths of radio frequencies.
• All 27 antennas work together, their data merged to create detailed images: “We actually combine the voltages or the signals from pairs of antennas… summed together and make the pretty pictures that you see on our website.” – Montana Williams [04:53]

5. History and Milestones of the VLA

[05:23–06:26]

• Operational since 1980; construction began in 1974.
• Early 'wow moments' included seeing distant galaxies and uncovering hidden activity at galactic centers—discovering that galaxies once considered "boring" are actually dynamic radio sources.
• The VLA enabled unprecedented views of our galaxy’s center and black hole environment by penetrating dust and gas.

6. Multi-Wavelength Astronomy: The Crab Nebula Example

[06:58–08:23]

• Williams explains how combining radio, X-ray, optical, and infrared observations yields a comprehensive understanding of cosmic objects.
• For the Crab Nebula, the VLA studies its millisecond pulsar, whose “lighthouse effect” is invisible in optical but prominent in radio frequencies.

7. Other VLA Achievements

[08:49–09:12]

• Imaged Jupiter’s magnetic field by tracking electrons—a scientific first in the 1990s.

8. The Future: The ngVLA

[09:26–10:39]

• The Next Generation Very Large Array (ngVLA) is in development—about 70% the size of current antennas but more numerous.
• Will combine the current VLA with the Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA), spanning from Hawaii to the Virgin Islands (over 5,300 miles), resulting in vastly improved sensitivity and resolution, up to 100 times greater.
• Prototype to begin testing in the next few months; full implementation targeted for about a decade from now.

9. VLA Operations and Daily Life

[11:46–13:23]

• Wednesdays are reserved for maintenance (“band aid, duct tape fixes”); other days, the VLA operates 24/7, closed only on Thanksgiving and Christmas.
• Radio observations can continue during the day—even through clouds. The main limitation is atmospheric interference, making night observations preferable.
• “We’re open 363 days out of the year, so we’re closed for Thanksgiving and Christmas…” – Montana Williams [12:39]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “The colors are showing you how intense the electromagnetic waves from that specific area are.” – Montana [01:58]
• “We were actually the ones that helped discover ice on Mercury… the first ones to discover the first Einstein ring.” – Montana [03:32]
• “So we can actually get an image closer to the center of our galaxy and closer to the edge of the black hole.” – Montana [06:45]
• “The radio kind of helps tie all of this together.” – Montana, on multi-wavelength composites of the Crab Nebula [08:10]
• “The NGVLA … will span the continent and then it will have more of them. So we’ll have increased resolution sensitivity. It’ll just blow anything that we have out of the water.” – Montana [09:48]
• “Wednesday is the most chaotic day. You're at the tail end of it, so it's a little bit calmer. But that's the day where we go and we do band aid, duct tape fixes…” – Montana [11:59]

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Important Segment Timestamps

• Introduction & VLA Background: [00:05–00:39]
• Radio Telescope Technology: [00:42–03:10]
• Major Discoveries: [03:10–04:37]
• How the Array Combines Data: [04:37–05:15]
• VLA History & Milestones: [05:23–06:26]
• Multi-Wavelength Example – Crab Nebula: [06:58–08:23]
• Jupiter’s Magnetic Field Imaging: [08:49–09:12]
• Next Generation VLA (ngVLA): [09:26–10:39]
• Daily Life at the VLA: [11:46–13:23]

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Tone and Style

The episode is enthusiastic, educational, and accessible, blending technical detail with conversational curiosity. Montana’s explanations are clear and full of analogies. Mondo maintains a sense of wonder throughout, making the content approachable for lay audiences interested in science, astronomy, or faith-based perspectives on the cosmos.

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Conclusion

The episode offers an in-depth, behind-the-scenes look at one of the world’s most important astronomical instruments, chronicling its legacy, ongoing operations, and the promising future of global radio astronomy. It highlights both the human and technological efforts behind cosmic discovery and leaves listeners with a sense of awe at the universe’s complexity and beauty—as well as what’s yet to be uncovered.

Transcript

[A]

Hey, everyone. Mono Gonzalez here from the Psalm 19 project. We are in New Mexico at the Very Large Array, as you can see behind us. And I am here with Montana. Very nice to have you.

[B]

Thank you for having me.

[A]

And for our audience, kind of share a little bit about what you do here.

[B]

Absolutely. So my name is Montana Williams, and I'm the senior Education Officer here at the vla. So that means I oversee all of the education and public outreach that we do. So that includes the tours when you visit on the weekends, also includes reserve tours for, like, schools and stuff like that. Then we also go out into New Mexico and go to the schools and try to help with the science education in the state.

[A]

Yeah. So how long has the. Well, VLA is the Very Large Array? Maybe tell us what that means and kind of give us some of the. Some of the technical background to what we see here on this big scope and then how many there are and the miles and everything else. It's really fascinating.

[B]

Yeah. So this is the Very Large Array. This happens to be antenna number 11 right behind us. And so there are a total of 28 antennas, 27 of which are on a sort of Y configuration. And the Y shape is in the railroad tracks because we actually move them. And we have four different configurations, and they're called A, B, C and D. And it goes from 22 miles in diameter to down to 0.6 miles in diameter. We're currently in B, which is about 11 miles in diameter.

[A]

Yeah, so it, the. If you come and you see the telescopes or, I mean, the railroad tracks, at first I was like, what is this for? But now I kind of understand how it is. So the radio telescope is. Is unusual. We do a lot of astrophotography and stuff. So we're used to visible, you know, visual telescopes. Maybe explain for the audience what is a radio telescope. It's not something that you're just going to put your eyeball up and look at.

[B]

Yeah. So radio telescopes, honestly work a lot like the old satellite dishes to get DirecTV and stuff like that back in the day. And so we use the same kind of design. So these are Cassigrade, much like many optical telescopes, but instead of having a CCD or a camera, we essentially record the voltage coming through. And so what we remember is where we're looking on the sky, and we basically reverse plot it back on the sky. And so when you see the colors from the images from the vla, the colors are showing you how intense the electromagnetic waves from that specific area are.

[A]

And so, like For I know that this, this happens when you look at telescopes, you know, whether it's infrared, all of the things that you don't see visually. James Webb is another example. Explain how they take a non visual like frequency or even a range, and then they shift it to make it visual and pretty. And you're like, oh, what am I looking at? But in reality that's maybe explain that help for people.

[B]

Yeah. So we. So even actually a lot of cameras like James Webb and other telescopes, they record the same thing we do. They essentially record a voltage, but they sort of record that energy. And so the astronomers know that what energy and what wavelength they're recording at what. But then when we make the pretty pictures and we make the plots, we're just really showing the intensity and where it's at in the sky. And so they work under the same idea as this. So when you see the James Webb and you see the galaxies, the brighter the galaxy, the more intense the infrared is from that area. So works from voltages.

[A]

Yeah, and it's really fascinating because it's still real. It's just made to where we can see it in a very visual way. And this was one of the places that many of you might know where, where Jodie Foster was here in the movie Contact. There's a lot of other films that are done here. What have been some of the discoveries? I mean really, I guess the question would be how important is this to astronomy?

[B]

Well, I think it's incredibly important. I'm very biased, but. So we were actually the ones that helped discover ice on Mercury. We were also the first ones to discover the first Einstein ring. So when you have a really heavy object, so like a cluster of galaxies or a really big galaxy, the light around from behind it will actually sort of bend. And so we were the first one to discover the first full ring of that. And then we also do a lot of stuff with like star formation, so how our stars formed, how our planetary systems formed, and that kind of thing. And then also we do a lot of galaxy, like studying that to understand galaxies, to understand how our galaxy works and that kind of thing.

[A]

The why does it have to be so big?

[B]

Because of the long wavelengths of the radio frequency. So you're limited in what you can see and like the resolution you can see based on the size of your telescope. So the 25 meters will have terrible resolution at radio wavelengths. But if we expand them into the 22 miles, then we can see the really fine details of like say a faraway radio galaxy.

[A]

The idea is you have again, this, you know, 25 meter. I would love to have a visual telescope that big. But they're working. All these 28 are working together in order to produce again, the desired outcome.

[B]

Yes. So we have a total of 27 antennas on the array. And then what we do is we actually combine the voltages or the signals from pairs of antennas, and we do that for basically every nanosecond or so of observations. And so that's a total of 351 pairs. And we're doing that all the time for all of our observations, which are then summed together and make the pretty pictures that you see on our website.

[A]

Yeah, which. Which is really phenomenal. And to see all the research done there, the talk about, you know, any. How long have you been here?

[B]

I've been here about five years.

[A]

Five years. Okay, so. And how long has. Has the array been here itself?

[B]

So the construction started in 1974, but we commemorated and had all 27 online starting in 1980. Okay.

[A]

So it's had quite, quite a bit of work. So, you know, 45, 50 years. What are some of the, maybe the, the wow moments or the exciting moments. We're like, oh, man, we really, this is what we wanted. This is what we built it for. And it really paid off.

[B]

Yeah. So especially when the. I mean, it still is true today, but especially when the VLA was first constructed, like, this was the first time that we could ever really see some of these faraway galaxies. The other thing too is it was built for what we call active galactic nuclei. So at the center of our galaxy, we have a supermassive black hole. Sometimes stuff gets sort of in it and it like, sometimes it can actually shoot stuff back out instead of just falling in. It's not quite like a vacuum. It's due to the conservation of angular momentum. When you, when that happens, a lot of times a lot of the emission isn't actually seen in the optical. So we were looking at these galaxies and they were just boring galaxies. And then now in the radio, we can see that it's a lot more complex and do a lot more testing of physics with it.

[A]

It's pretty fascinating because when I've taken pictures of the, like towards the galaxy and Sagittarius really heart, it's just white. It's blown out. I mean, and so to have the radio really energy, the radio light waves coming, they're able to get through all of the gas.

[B]

Yeah, they're able to get through all of the dust and the gas because of the Long wavelengths. And so we can actually get an image closer to the center of our galaxy and closer to the edge of the black hole. So we can actually see a lot more of the dynamics that are going on with that as well.

[A]

Yeah, it's pretty fascinating because one of the things that they have inside, which I've seen this before, was looking at a, like, the Crab Nebula. Describe the different, really, wavelengths that are there and how they kind of make this kind of composite image to really understand the full picture.

[B]

Yeah. So the Crab Nebula has a millisecond pulsar. And so pulsar is a neutron star. So it's a sort of dead, dying star, but it has really intense magnetic fields. And then it actually has, like, these beams of radiation at the poles of the field. And it kind of causes a lighthouse effect when they pass over Earth as they rotate. And so the one at the center of the Crab pulsar is really fast. And so you can just imagine a really fast lighthouse at the center of it. And then it's really only visible in the radio and a little bit in X rays and stuff. And so by piecing them all together, so in the X ray, you have this sort of. You can see it ionizing all the gas around it, kind of like you can in the optical, but you can see more precise. So you can specifically see how it's ionizing, like, the hydrogen or something like that. And then we can also do a lot of physics with the pulsars, which I don't know much about, unfortunately. But then in the optical, you just see this sort of expanded gas cloud. And then in infrared, you see some of the hotter areas near the center of the star. And then an X ray, you'll see just the pulsar at the center. And so the radio kind of helps tie all of this together. So you can figure out, also backtrack the physics into what happened when it erupted and that kind of thing.

[A]

Yeah, it's really fascinating. If you go to our website, you can see the picture that we took of the Crab Nebula, but it's just this very narrow snapshot in the visible range where you have all these other things that are going on behind the scenes. So this is, like, this is what's exciting about, you know, having a variety of telescopes in the. In the. In this astronomy world or the scientific world, because we get such a bigger picture of all these things that are hidden behind there.

[B]

Yeah. So for another example, too, is so for Jupiter, we were actually able to image the electrons going around in the Magnetic field. So in a sense we could almost image the magnetic field. And so when we did that back in the 90s, and so it was the first, we were really trying to figure out what the magnetic field of Jupiter really was like from an observational standpoint. So that was another cool thing we did. And you can find the picture on our website.

[A]

Yeah, see, this is the awesome thing. So this was done, as you mentioned, in 1980. And so technology's changed a lot since then. And so what's next on the agenda in the sense of radio waves?

[B]

So the thing that's sort of next is a very creatively called the Next generation Very Large Array, or the ngvla. And so those will actually be different than the ones that you see behind us. They'll be about 70% in size and then there will be more of them. So the NGVLA will replace both the VLA and the very Long Baseline Array, which is tin antennas like these spread throughout the United States all the way from Mauna Kean, Hawaii to St. Croix and the Virgin Islands. And so it will span the continent and then it will have more of them. So we'll have increased resolution sensitivity. It'll just blow anything that we have out of the water.

[A]

And so we're talking like large distances of these telescopes working together. And what would you said Hawaii all

[B]

the way, Hawaii to St. Croix, the Virgin islands. So that's 5351 miles.

[A]

Think about that. And again, the resolution I was reading in there, same thing. It's just 100 times resolution or whatever. When is that supposed to come online?

[B]

So we have the prototype hopefully coming on in the next couple of months. And then we're going to go through like a sort of year testing, making sure it meets all the requirements that we want for the antenna. And then also that I can withstand the New Mexico seasons. And then after that we'll start hopefully working on it. So I think we're about a decade out currently.

[A]

And so you used the word, maybe you didn't. I don't know. Is it going to replace this?

[B]

Essentially, yes, it will, because this will be.

[A]

I mean, obviously. Why have we use an old one now? Will these be taken down and removed? Will other they'll be replaced? How many will be here?

[B]

So there will be about 100, 150. Like nothing's quite finalized yet. But we're putting like the bulk of them here in the plains of San Augustine, which is where we're at today. And then the rest of them will span the United States. And some of them will take over where current VLBA stations are, and then we'll have, like, new places as well.

[A]

And have they mentioned, like, just a. Any specific projects that they, that they look at or maybe Galaxy or something? They're like, man, we got this resolution. But if we had this. Do they have anything in their mind of what they want?

[B]

We do. I can't think of them off the top of my head, unfortunately. But no, there's like, the sensitivity. Like, we're going to be able to see better pictures and get closer to the star formations. We're going to get more detailed pictures of the gas at the center of our galaxy. We have a whole list of papers on our website about the capabilities that NGVLA will allow us to do.

[A]

So, like, in general, what's life like here on a daily basis? Today's Wednesday, so I understand it's maintenance day.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

But what's it like on a normal day here?

[B]

So Wednesday is the most chaotic day. You're at the tail end of it, so it's a little bit calmer. But that's the day where we go and we do band aid, duct tape fixes. We're constantly going on and off of antennas to make sure that everything's working properly and things like that. We're also doing a lot of stuff in terms of the computers that are upkeeping the VLA and running the VLA and stuff like that. And so that starts at 7am wow. Okay. And goes to about 3 or 4pm which by that time things go back to sort of normal science operations where it gets a little bit quieter, but it can still be quite busy. And so they do do observations and they just stare at whatever chunk of the sky they're asked to.

[A]

Wow. And. And it's, it's. For all the other days, it's pretty much 24, 7.

[B]

Yeah. So we're open 363 days out of the year, so we're closed for Thanksgiving and Christmas, but we're still open and observing, basically.

[A]

Now the. During the day. Right. Does, obviously that would. I imagine that they wouldn't be. They would be looking somewhere away from the sun during the day.

[B]

For the most part, you can look at the sun. So radio astronomy actually historically got its start by doing solar radio astronomy at the end of World War II. But a lot of what we do, we tend to look away from it. About 30 degrees or so. Away from it.

[A]

Yeah. That's good.

[B]

And then the actual problem during the day is more of the atmosphere causing issues for us. And so the night observations are usually the more contested.

[A]

And so in this regard, too, clouds don't bother or anything, right?

[B]

Not really. You can do some of the high frequency observations, but you can do lower frequencies. Yeah.

[A]

Through the clouds and everything. I mean, think about how fascinating that is where you can, you can be taking images through the, through the clouds. Montana. I really appreciate all this and thank you everybody for joining us in this, this little visit here in the, in the, really the middle of New Mexico. It's a beautiful day today. It's been a great time to film, so continue to check out our stuff. You go to Psalm19project.com and we're going to be doing a lot of other videos. We're here in town or close to town because we are going to be opening up an observatory or participating in a remote observatory on a local mountain here to get images that are a lot better than what we can get in Oklahoma or some of our other sites. So thanks for watching and we'll catch you next time.