Conceptual Design for the Square Kilometer Array

Abstract. New technologies have made it possible to construct an af-fordable radio telescope with collecting area of one square km: the SKA. Such a telescope would be so powerful that we could expand our knowl-edge of the universe from the earliest stages of its formation through to planetary exploration with greatly enhanced spacecraft communications. The SKA will join the new generation of telescopes at other wavebands with the sensitivity and resolution to image the earliest phases of galaxy formation, as well as greatly extending the range of unique science acces-sible at radio wavelengths. We already know how to build an SKA, the issue is how to build the most cost effective SKA, and how to maximize the science we can do with it. This project was born International and a number of countries are now comparing conceptual designs. All imple-mentations call on Moore’s law to satisfy the computationally demanding requirements. Some are more demanding than others and involve tech-nologies and operational procedures never previously implemented in an astronomical facility