An Agile, Precision Digital Spectrometer for Radio Science

将设计和建造一个频谱分析仪，用于对球状星团和选定区域的毫秒脉冲星进行射电天文观测。这种仪器将增加我们对恒星演化的理解。毫秒脉冲星的精确计时将探测宇宙引力波背景的长波端。不同质量的超大质量黑洞的合并可以通过感应它们发出的引力诱导辐射来探测。该仪器将是一个频谱分析仪，每张卡的带宽为10到100兆赫。将审议五种办法，并选择一种办法加以执行。我们的计划是研究这项技术，并在商业设备中使用发展最快、最流行的架构，这些设备既有广泛的用户基础，又有坚实的支持框架。最可能的方法是为频谱分析仪使用一组市售数字信号处理器。目前正在考虑每秒1千兆浮点运算的高速处理器。＊＊＊

Backer award abstractAST-9987278A spectrum analyzer for radio astronomy observations of millisecond pulsars in globular clusters and in selected field regions will be designed and built. This instrumentation will add to our understanding of stellar evolution. Precision timing of millisecond pulsars will probe the long-wavelength end of the cosmic gravitational wave background. The coalescence of super massive black holes of varying masses may be detected by sensing the gravitationally induced radiation they emit. The instrumentation will be a spectrum analyzer with 10 to 100 Mega Hertz bandwidth per card. Five approaches will be considered and one selected for implementation. The plan is to examine the technology and to use the most rapidly developing and popular architecture available in a commercial device that both has an extensive user base an da solid support framework. The most likely approach is to use an array of commercially available digital signal processors for the spectrum analyzer. High-speed processors in the range of 1 giga floating point operations per second are being considered. ***