Light-Deflection Test of General Relativity (Physics)

夏皮罗教授的团队将分析1987年的甚长基线干涉测量(VLBI)实验的数据，以实现将广义相对论的经典测试：太阳对光的偏转的精度提高10倍。1987年10月2日至14日成功记录的干涉测量数据主要包括两个射电源的观测：3C279和3C273B，前者在10月被太阳遮盖，后者作为参照物。信号被记录在三个相隔很远的射频频段：2、8和23 GHz。这样的频率覆盖将使他们能够利用日冕和电离层等离子体中无线电波的已知色散关系，从观测中消除它们的大部分影响。辅助数据将被用来解释地球方位变化、两个源的亮度分布以及地球中性大气的影响。他们期望以103的标准误差确定挠度(即，将参数化后牛顿形式的参数确定为103的两部分)。

Professor Shapiro's group will analyze the data from a 1987 very-long-baseline interferometry (VLBI) experiment to achieve a tenfold improvement in the accuracy of a classical test of general relativity: the deflection of light by the Sun. The interferometric data successfully recorded on 2-14 October 1987 consist primarily of observations of two radio sources: 3C279 and 3C273B, the former occulted by the Sun on October and the latter serving as a reference object. Signals were recorded in three widely-separated radio-frequency bands: 2, 8, and 23 GHz. Such frequency coverage will allow them to use the known dispersion relation for radio waves in the coronal and ionospheric plasmas to remove most of their effects from the observations. Auxiliary data will be used to account for the effects of the variations in Earth orientation, the brightness distributions of the two sources, and the Earth's neutral atmosphere. They expect to determine the deflection with a standard error of one part in 103 (i.e., to determine the parameter of the parameterized-post-Newtonian formalism to two parts in 103).