And one ring to rule them all

HF loop antenna being inspected before shipping to Svalbard.

I'm right now in the process of installing an HF radar in Svalbard. This will be a new type of a spread spectrum radar, which I have been working on for the last three years. The hope is that we'll be able to do all sorts of cool science by looking at ionospheric waves with this milliwatt class radar.

Last Friday I was packing all of the gear, when certain Lord of the Rings enthusiasts helped me make some final touches to the active HF receiver loop antenna I'm going to install. Apparently there are a people in our group that know how to write the language of Mordor in Elvic rune. I'm sure this will give the antenna an extra tenth of a dB sensitivity. 

Look out for the Spread-spectrum Hf-radar Ionospheric Research Experiment (SHIRE), which is enable by the Software AUgmented Radar Observation Network (SAURON)!