The project is principally funded by the United States Naval Research Laboratory (NRL), which also supports the Navy Optical Interferometer near Flagstaff, Arizona.

[4] The MRO 2.4-meter achieved first light on October 31, 2006, and began regular operations on September 1, 2008, after a commissioning phase that included tracking near-Earth asteroid 2007 WD5 for NASA.

[8] On October 9, 2009, New Mexico Tech scientists used instruments on the MRO 2.4-meter and at the Etscorn Campus Observatory to observe controlled impacts of two NASA Centaur rockets at the southern polar region of the moon as part of the LCROSS Project.

[9][10] On October 23, 2015, it was announced that the MRO telescope will receive funding from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) in early 2016 to monitor the launch and re-entry of commercial space vehicles from Spaceport America.

The MROI was designed with three research areas in mind: star and planet formation, stellar accretion and mass loss, and active galactic nuclei.

[12] An interferometer was selected because such devices can be built with higher resolving power than single-mirror telescopes, enabling them to image distant objects in greater detail.

[13] In October 2015, New Mexico Tech signed a five-year, $25 million cooperative agreement with the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) to support continued development of the interferometer at the observatory.

Dr. Van Romero, Vice President of Research at Tech, said the new funding will allow the completion of three telescopes, mounts and enclosures on the mountaintop facility.