Array Configurations That Tile the Plane

Future radiotelescopes need ever increasing sensitivity. With the limits of receiver sensitivity being reached this can only be achieved by increasing collecting area. The increase in antenna numbers and the multi-resolution capabilities of these telescopes, such as the SKA, means a significant departure from existing designs is needed. In this article, some fundamental designs for antenna arrays that uniformly sample the UV plane are presented. The SKA is used to provide target specifications. The designs presented allow asymmetric configurations providing more freedom for site selection. They also allow a direct tradeoff between field of view and correlator complexity. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.