The VLBA CANDELS GOODS-North Survey – I. survey design, processing, data products, and source counts

Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society Oxford University Press 529:3 (2024) 2428-2442

Authors:

Roger P Deane, Jack F Radcliffe, Ann Njeri, Alexander Akoto-Danso, Gianni Bernardi, Oleg M Smirnov, Rob Beswick, Michael A Garrett, Matthew J Jarvis, Imogen H Whittam, Stephen Bourke, Zsolt Paragi

Abstract:

The past decade has seen significant advances in wide-field cm-wave very long baseline interferometry (VLBI), which is timely given the wide-area, synoptic survey-driven strategy of major facilities across the electromagnetic spectrum. While wide-field VLBI poses significant post-processing challenges that can severely curtail its potential scientific yield, many developments in the km-scale connected-element interferometer sphere are directly applicable to addressing these. Here we present the design, processing, data products, and source counts from a deep (11 μJy beam−1), quasi-uniform sensitivity, contiguous wide-field (160 arcmin2) 1.6 GHz VLBI survey of the CANDELS GOODS-North field. This is one of the best-studied extragalactic fields at milli-arcsecond resolution and, therefore, is well-suited as a comparative study for our Tera-pixel VLBI image. The derived VLBI source counts show consistency with those measured in the COSMOS field, which broadly traces the AGN population detected in arcsecond-scale radio surveys. However, there is a distinctive flattening in the S1.4GHz ∼100–500 μJy flux density range, which suggests a transition in the population of compact faint radio sources, qualitatively consistent with the excess source counts at 15 GHz that is argued to be an unmodelled population of radio cores. This survey approach will assist in deriving robust VLBI source counts and broadening the discovery space for future wide-field VLBI surveys, including VLBI with the Square Kilometre Array, which will include new large field-of-view antennas on the African continent at ≳1000 km baselines. In addition, it may be useful in the design of both monitoring and/or rapidly triggered VLBI transient programmes.

GW190425: Pan-STARRS and ATLAS coverage of the skymap and limits on optical emission associated with FRB 20190425A

Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society Oxford University Press (OUP) 528:2 (2024) 2299-2307

Authors:

SJ Smartt, M Nicholl, S Srivastav, ME Huber, KC Chambers, KW Smith, DR Young, MD Fulton, JL Tonry, CW Stubbs, L Denneau, AJ Cooper, A Aamer, JP Anderson, A Andersson, J Bulger, T-W Chen, P Clark, T de Boer, H Gao, JH Gillanders, A Lawrence, CC Lin, TB Lowe, EA Magnier, P Minguez, T Moore, A Rest, L Shingles, R Siverd, IA Smith, B Stalder, HF Stevance, R Wainscoat, R Williams

The fast transient AT 2023clx in the nearby LINER galaxy NGC 3799 as a tidal disruption of a very low-mass star

(2024)

Authors:

P Charalampopoulos, R Kotak, T Wevers, G Leloudas, T Kravtsov, M Pursiainen, P Ramsden, TM Reynolds, A Aamer, JP Anderson, I Arcavi, Y-Z Cai, T-W Chen, M Dennefeld, L Galbany, M Gromadzki, CP Guti'errez, N Ihanec, T Kangas, E Kankare, E Kool, A Lawrence, P Lundqvist, L Makrygianni, S Mattila, TE Müller-Bravo, M Nicholl, F Onori, A Sahu, SJ Smartt, J Sollerman, Y Wang, DR Young

Design and development of Low Gain Avalanche Detectors using Teledyne e2v process

Journal of Instrumentation IOP Publishing 19:01 (2024) C01038-C01038

Authors:

E Giulio Villani, P Allport, K Ball, R Bell, D Bortoletto, M Gazi, L Gonella, D Hynds, D Jordan, I Kopsalis, S McMahon, J Mulvey, R Plackett, D Weatherill

Abstract:

The Low Gain Avalanche Detectors (LGAD) has become the preferred technological choice for fast track timing detectors in High Energy Physics applications. Additional uses of such sensors are currently being investigated, ranging from Light Detection and Ranging (LIDAR) to Low Let particle dosimetry in medical and space applications. This paper describes the development and test of LGAD devices, fabricated using a commercial process from Teledyne e2v silicon foundry. Motivation behind the project, and details of the TCAD simulations of the manufacturing process and of the electrical performances of the devices will be provided. Test results on gain and time resolution using laser injection will also be shown

The Simons Observatory: beam characterization for the small aperture telescopes

Astrophysical Journal IOP Publishing 961:1 (2024) 138

Authors:

Nadia Dachlythra, Adriaan J Duivenvoorden, Jon E Gudmundsson, Matthew Hasselfield, Gabriele Coppi, Alexandre E Adler, David Alonso, Susanna Azzoni, Grace E Chesmore, Giulio Fabbian, Ken Ganga, Remington G Gerras, Andrew H Jaffe, Bradley R Johnson, Brian Keating, Reijo Keskitalo, Theodore S Kisner, Nicoletta Krachmalnicoff, Marius Lungu, Frederick Matsuda, Sigurd Naess, Lyman Page, Roberto Puddu, Giuseppe Puglisi, Sara M Simon, Grant Teply, Tran Tsan, Edward J Wollack, Kevin Wolz, Zhilei Xu

Abstract:

We use time-domain simulations of Jupiter observations to test and develop a beam reconstruction pipeline for the Simons Observatory Small Aperture Telescopes. The method relies on a mapmaker that estimates and subtracts correlated atmospheric noise and a beam fitting code designed to compensate for the bias caused by the mapmaker. We test our reconstruction performance for four different frequency bands against various algorithmic parameters, atmospheric conditions, and input beams. We additionally show the reconstruction quality as a function of the number of available observations and investigate how different calibration strategies affect the beam uncertainty. For all of the cases considered, we find good agreement between the fitted results and the input beam model within an ∼1.5% error for a multipole range ℓ = 30–700 and an ∼0.5% error for a multipole range ℓ = 50–200. We conclude by using a harmonic-domain component separation algorithm to verify that the beam reconstruction errors and biases observed in our analysis do not significantly bias the Simons Observatory r-measurement