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The National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO) is a facility of the National Science Foundation (NSF) operated under cooperative agreement by Associated Universities, Inc. (AUI). NRAO provides state-of-the-art radio telescope facilities for use by the international scientific community for forefront research in radio astronomy.

NRAO's major facilities include the Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array (VLA) in central New Mexico and the Robert C. Byrd Green Bank Telescope (GBT) in West Virginia. The VLA consists of 27 radio telescopes spread along three arms, each 21 kilometers long, forming a Y-shaped array. It is an interferometer, meaning that the signals from the individual telescopes are combined to achieve much finer resolution than is possible with any single telescope. The GBT is the world's largest fully steerable radio telescope, with a 100-meter diameter dish. It is used for a wide range of research, including studies of the Milky Way, other galaxies, and pulsars.

In addition to its major facilities, NRAO operates several smaller telescopes and instruments. These include the Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA), a network of ten radio telescopes spread across the United States and Puerto Rico; the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), a collaboration with the European Southern Observatory (ESO) and the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (NAOJ); and the Very Large Telescope (VLT), a collaboration with ESO.

NRAO also develops and operates state-of-the-art instrumentation for use on its telescopes. This includes receivers, antennas, and other hardware, as well as software for data acquisition and analysis. NRAO's staff also provides training and support for users of its facilities and instruments.

NRAO's mission is to provide the scientific community with the tools and expertise needed to make groundbreaking discoveries in radio astronomy. NRAO's facilities and staff have played a key role in many important astronomical discoveries, including the discovery of pulsars, the first images of black holes, and the detection of gravitational waves. NRAO also plays an important role in the development of new technologies for radio astronomy, such as the development of new types of receivers and antennas.

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