LEAP: the large European array for pulsars
LEAP: the large European array for pulsars
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DOI：
10.1093/mnras/stv2755
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发表时间：
2015-11
影响因子：
4.8
通讯作者：
C. Bassa;G. Janssen;R. Karuppusamy;R. Karuppusamy;M. Kramer;Kejia Lee;Kang Liu;J. McKee;D. Perrodin;M. Purver;S. Sanidas;R. Smits;B. Stappers
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文献类型：
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作者：
C. Bassa;G. Janssen;R. Karuppusamy;R. Karuppusamy;M. Kramer;Kejia Lee;Kang Liu;J. McKee;D. Perrodin;M. Purver;S. Sanidas;R. Smits;B. Stappers
大型欧洲脉冲星阵列（LEAP）是一项实验，它收集了欧洲最大的射电望远镜的集体力量，以提高高精度脉冲星计时的灵敏度。作为欧洲脉冲星定时阵列（EPTA）正在进行的努力的一部分，LEAP的目标是超越首次直接探测引力波所需的灵敏度阈值。LEAP目前包括的五个望远镜是：Effelsberg望远镜，Jodrell Bank的Lovell望远镜，Nan 'c cay射电望远镜，Sardinia射电望远镜和Westerbork综合射电望远镜。双极化，奈奎斯特采样的时间序列的传入无线电波被记录和离线处理，以形成相干和，从而产生一个捆绑阵列望远镜的有效孔径相当于一个195米直径的圆盘。所有观测都是使用以1396 MHz频率为中心的128 MHz带宽进行的。本文介绍了LEAP实验的设计、仪器、数据的存储和传输以及处理的硬件和软件。特别是，我们提出的软件流水线，旨在处理的奈奎斯特采样的时间序列，测量每个单独的望远镜和参考望远镜之间的相位和时间延迟，并应用这些延迟，形成捆绑阵列相干加法。该管道包括偏振校准和干扰缓解。我们还提出了从LEAP的第一个结果，并证明由此产生的灵敏度的增加，从而导致脉冲到达时间的改善。
The Large European Array for Pulsars (LEAP) is an experiment that harvests the collective power of Europe's largest radio telescopes in order to increase the sensitivity of high-precision pulsar timing. As part of the ongoing effort of the European Pulsar Timing Array (EPTA), LEAP aims to go beyond the sensitivity threshold needed to deliver the first direct detection of gravitational waves. The five telescopes presently included in LEAP are: the Effelsberg telescope, the Lovell telescope at Jodrell Bank, the Nan\c cay radio telescope, the Sardinia Radio Telescope and the Westerbork Synthesis Radio Telescope. Dual polarization, Nyquist-sampled time-series of the incoming radio waves are recorded and processed offline to form the coherent sum, resulting in a tied-array telescope with an effective aperture equivalent to a 195-m diameter circular dish. All observations are performed using a bandwidth of 128 MHz centered at a frequency of 1396 MHz. In this paper, we present the design of the LEAP experiment, the instrumentation, the storage and transfer of data, and the processing hardware and software. In particular, we present the software pipeline that was designed to process the Nyquist-sampled time-series, measure the phase and time delays between each individual telescope and a reference telescope and apply these delays to form the tied-array coherent addition. The pipeline includes polarization calibration and interference mitigation. We also present the first results from LEAP and demonstrate the resulting increase in sensitivity, which leads to an improvement in the pulse arrival times.