The Australia Telescope National Facility

CSIRO's radio astronomy observatories are collectively known as the Australia Telescope National Facility (ATNF). This consists of a set of radio telescopes, provided as a national research facility for use by Australian and international researchers.

Six of the telescopes make up CSIRO's Australia Telescope Compact Array (ATCA), located at the Paul Wild Observatory near the town of Narrabri. Each of these antennas has a reflecting surface with a diameter of 22 metres. A further 22-metre antenna, known as the CSIRO Mopra telescope, is located near Coonabarabran.

The ATNF also includes the CSIRO Parkes 64-metre radio telescope. This telescope has been successfully operated since 1961. Upgrades to accommodate a 13-beam focal plane array have maintained its world-class position as a state-of-the-art instrument.

A fourth CSIRO telescope, the Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder (ASKAP), is currently being built at the Murchison Radio-astronomy Observatory in Western Australia. ASKAP will be made up of 36 antennas, each 12 metres in diameter, working together as a single instrument. Once complete, ASKAP will provide Australian and international astronomers with another world-leading astronomy observatory. It will also be operated by CSIRO as part of the ATNF.

The telescopes, as well as stand alone instruments, can also be used together as a Long Baseline Array (LBA) for a technique known as Very Long Baseline Interferometry (VLBI).