National Radio Astronomy Observatory

The National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO) is, since 1956, a federally funded research and development center of the United States National Science Foundation, operated under cooperative agreement by Associated Universities, Inc. for the purpose of radio astronomy. NRAO designs, builds and operates its own high-sensitivity radio telescopes for use by scientists around the world. Its headquarters is located on the campus of the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, Virginia, where the North American ALMA Science Center and the NRAO Technology Center and Central Development Laboratory are also found. Until October 2016 it operated the world's largest fully steerable radio telescope, the Robert C. Byrd Green Bank Telescope near Green Bank, West Virginia.