Why radio works better than optical

28:38>> that's the main one okay >> it's the data stream not the complexity in the sense of like computational complexity >> volume >> uh no in terms of literal physics of um radio is slow >> ah okay that makes sense that makes sense radio is slow the radio wavelengths are longer which means the cycle of the light is slower. Okay. Now, here's the key thing with interpherometry. What I need to do is interfere the light signals, which means a wave is coming in over here, a wave is coming in over here. I need to know the exact timing of these waves so that I can add them up >> and destructively and constructively interfere them. Mhm. >> Now with radio astronomy like something

29:18like the VA right um the you're looking at about the the cycle the cycle between these things is going to be about 10 -12 to 10 - 10 seconds. So like um you know 09 or 10 zeros and then 1 second is going to be the cycle time of this thing. Okay. This is in the this is in the megahertz to gigahertz range. And that's something that we know how to do, >> right? Radio, like literally the radio in your car, right? We know how to tune stuff at that range. Okay. >> Um and what that means is we've got the timing just right that we can add them up and subtract them and so on and so

29:59forth. >> Um so what you can do with radio astronomy is you can take data at the South Pole and take data in Spain and take data in Hawaii and stuff like that. rig it up to a clock that is accurate enough and then when you put it all together with like your pabytes and pabytes of data, you have the tag of like when the signal came and you can you can you can match and you can do the computational >> you can make the math math. You can make the math math, right? With um with optical now, you run into the block that the cycle time is faster than your clock. Like the light that's coming in is faster than the reliable clock that you have to record the thing. So you

30:41can't actually line up the signals. >> That makes it makes total sense, >> right? And this is why so there is a