ASTR 3520

Observations & Instrumentation II:

Spectroscopy

Intro to
Radio Astronomy
Intro to Radio Astronomy

• Concepts
- Amplifiers
- Mixers (down-conversion)
- Principles of Radar
- Radio Astronomy basics:
System temperature, Receiver temperature
Brightness temperature,
The beam ( = / D) [ its usually BIG]
Interferometry (c.f. the Very Large Array – VLA)
Aperture synthesis
 Detection of EM Radiation Across the Spectrum
Incoherent detection Coherent detection
- Particle properties - Wave properties
(photons)
- Energy, arrival time - Amplitude, phase
- quantum noise:
Trec > h / 2

Transmission

-ray X-ray UV Visible NIR TIR sub-mm mm cm

radio

>MeV 0.2 – 100 keV 4000 – 10,000A 3 – 200 m 1 – 10 mm >1 cm

100 – 4000 A 1 – 3 m 200 m – 1000m


History of Radio Astronomy
(the second window on the Universe)

• 1929 - Karl Jansky (Bell Telephone Labs)

• 1030s - Grote Reber
• 1940s - WWII, radar
- 21 cm (Jan Oort etc.)
• 1950s - Early single dish & interferometry
- `radio stars’, first map of Milky Way
- Cambridge surveys (3C etc)
• 1960s - quasars, pulsars, CMB, radar, VLBI
aperture synthesis, molecules, masers (cm)
• 1970s - CO, molecular clouds, astro-chemistry (mm
• 1980s /90s – CMB anisotropy, (sub-mm)
Karl Jansky, Holmdel NJ, 1929
300 m dish at Arecibo:  / D ~ 48” at  = 6 cm (5 GHz)
408 MHz radio sky
 Outline
• A Simple Heterodyne Receiver System
– mixers and amplification
• Observing in the Radio
– resolution
– brightness temperature
• Radio Interferometry
• Aperture synthesis
 Mixers

A mixer takes two inputs:

local oscillator the signal and a local
signal in
LO oscillator (LO).
 
The mixer outputs the sum
signal out and difference frequencies.

and In radio astronomy, we
 usually filter out the high
frequency (sum) component.
 Mixers

LO
signal

mixed original
signal signal

0 Hz frequency
 Mixers
The negative
frequencies in the
difference appear the
same as a positive
frequency.
To avoid this, we can
use “Single Sideband
LO Mixers” (SSBs) which
signal

eliminate the negative

mixed original frequency components.
signal signal

0 Hz frequency
W-band
(94 GHz,
4 mm)
amplifier
 Single sideband mixer:
Local oscillator
Downconverted signal

Frequency
Band-pass of amplifier:
Intermediate frequency = IF
 Double sideband mixer:
Local oscillator
Lower sideband Upper sideband
Amplifier passband

FIF FLO

Frequency
 Local oscillator
Lower sideband Upper sideband
Amplifier passband

FIF FLO

Frequency
 ASTR 3520
Intro to Radio Aastronomy:
• Review heterodyne & mixing
Radar examples: cars, Venus (review)
• Single dish spectroscopy
Orion nebula CO example
• Radiometer equation (noise vs, exposure time)
• Interferometer basics
The U, V plane => Dirty beams,
Fourier Inversion => Dirty maps
De-convolve Dirty Beam => CLEAN maps
• The VLA, VLBA, and ALMA
Radar: Freflect = f trans + / - f f = 2 f (V/c)

f = 10 GHz
V = 100 km/h = 27.8 m /s
c = 3 x 1010 cm/s = 3 x 105 km/s f = 1850 Hz
Mixing: Adding waves together

Freflect = f trans + / - f

f trans

f = 1850 Hz
 Single sideband mixer:
Local oscillator
Downconverted signal

f = 10 GHz

F + f =
10 GHz + 1850 Hz
1850 Hz
f = fIF

Frequency
Band-pass of amplifier:
Intermediate frequency = IF
Planetary Radar imaging: Doppler shift + time delay = 2D map
Redshift Blueshift

Early echo
Radar Pulse
Late echo
UV
Venus

Radar

Radar
Venus
Radar
A Simple Heterodyne Receiver
signal @ 1420 MHz

receiver horn 1570 MHz

LO
low noise
amplifier
1420 MHz 150 MHz
+ filter +

Analog-to-Digital tunable
Computer
Converter filter

outputs a
power spectrum tunable ~150 MHz
LO
 Amplification
• Why is having a low noise first amp so
important?
– the noise in the first amp gets amplified by all
subsequent amps
– you want to amplify the signal before subsequent
electronics add noise
• Amplification is in units of deciBells (dB)
– logarithmic scale
• 3 dB = x2
V1
• 5 dB = x3
dB = 10 log10 ( )
•
•
10 dB = x10
20 dB = x100
V2
• 30 dB = x1000
 Observing in the Radio I

• We get frequency and phase information,

but not position on the sky
– 2D detector
• A CCD is also a 2D detector (we get x & y
position)
 Observing in the Radio II:
Typical Beamsize (Resolution)
• i.e. The BURAO 21 cm horn (D ~ 1 m)

λ 21cm
θ= ≈ = 12o
D 100cm
 Observing in the Radio II
• i.e. The NRAO GBT (D ~ 100 m)

at 21cm = 1.420 GHz

λ 21cm
θ= ≈ = 7. 2'
D 10000cm

at 0.3 cm = 100 GHz

λ 0.3cm
θ= ≈ = 0.10' = 6.2' '
D 10000cm
 Observing in the Radio II
• i.e. The Arecibo Telescope (D ~ 300 m)
at 21cm = 1.420 GHz
λ 21cm
θ= ≈ = 2.4'
D 30000cm

at 0.3 cm = 100 GHz

λ 0.3cm
θ= ≈ = 2.1' '
D 30000cm
300 m dish at Arecibo
Transmission (and brightness of the Atmosphere) depends on H2O!
 Observing in the Radio III:
Brightness Temperature
Flux: erg s-1 sr-1 cm-2 Hz-1 (1023 Jy)
B(T): erg s-1 sr-1 cm-2 Hz-1 (1023 Jy)
We can use temperature as a proxy for flux (Jy)

Conveniently, most radio signals have h/kT << 1,

so we can use the Raleigh-Jeans approximation

B(T) = 2kT/2

Thus, flux is linear with temperature

 Antenna Temperature
TB = F2/2k
• Brightness temperature (TB) gives the surface
temperature of the source (if it’s a thermal
spectrum)
• Antenna Temperature (TA):
– if the antenna beam is larger than the source, it
will see the source and some sky background, in
which case TA is less than TB
TA ~ TB s/b
 System Temperature
• Noise in the system is characterized by
the system temperature (Tsys)
– i.e. you want your system temperature
(especially in the first amp) to be low
 Radiometer Equation
• Trms =  Tsys / (  t) ½

– Trms = r.m.s. noise in observation

– a ~ (2)1/2 since you have to switch
off-source = position switch
off-frequency = frequency switch

– Tsys = System temperature

–  = bandwidth, frequency range observed
– t = integration time (how long is the exposure?)
 Spectral Resolution
• The spectral resolution in a radio
telescope can be limited by several issues:
– integration time (signal-to-noise)
– filter bank resolution (if you’re using a filter
bank to generate a power spectrum in
hardware)
•Single Dish line & continuum basics

•  =  / D ~ arc minutes
10 m @ 1 cm => 250”

• Brightness temperature: B(T) => I  T

• Radiometer equation:

TRMS = Tsys / (

Ex:  = 100 GHz,  = 1 MHz (= 3 km/s),  = 1 sec, Tsys = 1000 K

TRMS = 1  (Kelvin)
 Orion Molecular
Clouds

Orion B 13CO 2.6 mm

Orion Nebula
Orion A
 12
CO J=9-8
350 m
THz spectra!

OMC1
OMC1-S
(Kawamura et al. 2002)

CO
13

J=6-5 661 GHz

CO J=9-8
12

(discovery)

(Wilson et al. – in prep)

Milky Way all-sky: Visual wavelengths
Milky Way all-sky: Infrared wavelengths (COBE)
408 MHz radio sky
21 cm HI all-sky map
Dame et al. CO map of Milky Way
Dame et al. CO map of Milky Way

-Ophiucus

R Cor Aust. Galactic Center

Multi-transition analysis of outflow mass spectra
Multi-transition
Analysis of
Outflow mass
spectra
L1551 J=2-1 CO
L1551
[SII] with CO
 Radio Interferometry
e
urc
so
to
al
on lay
i
it de
s
po ase
ph

 

East
+
 Two Dish Interferometry
• The fringe pattern as a function of time
gives the East-West (RA) position of the
object
• Also think of the interferometer as painting
a fringe pattern on the sky
– the source moves through this pattern,
changing the amplitude as it goes
 Extended Sources
+ - + - + - +
• Spacing of the fringes is a function of
the projected baseline
• The area under the fringes determines
the amplitude of the signal (positive
fringes add, negative fringes subtract)
• The projected baseline changes as the
source rises or sets
 Extended Sources
A four hour observation of the Sun at 12 GHz
using a two dish E-W interferometer.
The narrow fringes
(not visible here),
represent the
positional delay.

The broad
envelope is the
self-interference of
the extended
source.
 Extended Sources
• In order to determine the extended object’s
shape, we must disentangle the fringes due
to the projected baseline (which we’d get
from a point source) from the interference of
the different parts of the source
– to do this, we use delay lines
– we introduce a delay between the two antennas
to compensate for the the positional delay
– this leaves only the fringes from the structure of
the source
 Aperture Synthesis
• A two dish interferometer only gives
information on the E-W (RA) structure of a
source
• To get 2D information, we want to use
several dishes spread out over two
dimensions on the ground
Radio Telescope Arrays
The VLA:
An array of 27 antennas
with 25 meter apertures

maximum baseline: 36 km

75 Mhz to 43 GHz
Very Large Array radio telescope (near Socorro NM)
 The VLA

An amplifier
 The U-V Plane
• Think of an array as a partially filled aperture
– the point source function (PSF) will be have
complicated structure (not an airy disk)
– the U-V plane shows what part of the aperture is
filled by a telescope
– this changes with time as the object rises and
sets
– a long exposure will have a better PSF because
there is better U-V plane coverage (closer to a
filled aperture)
 The U-V plane

a snapshot of the U-V plane U-V coverage in a

(VLBA) horizon to horizon exposure
Point Spread
The dirty Function
beam : the diffraction pattern of the array
 Fourier plane sampling
UV plane covered over 6 hrs
Amplitude of fringes on a source
 Examples
Dirty Beams:
A snapshot (few min)
of weighting
Full 10 hrs VLA+VLBA+GBT
 Image Deconvolution
• Interferometers have nasty PSFs
• To get a good image we “deconvolve” the
image with the PSF
– we know the PSF from the UV plane coverage
– computer programs take a PSF pattern in the
image and replace it with a point
– the image becomes a collection of point
sources
UV Plane Coverage and PSF

images from a presentation by Tim Cornwell (given at NRAO SISS 2002)

UV Plane Coverage and PSF

images from a presentation by Tim Cornwell (given at NRAO SISS 2002)

 Image Deconvolution

images from a presentation by Tim Cornwell (given at NRAO SISS 2002)

The Orion Nebula (at 1.4 GHz)
SNR Cassiopeia A
Continuum in 3 colors:
1.4 GHz (L band)
5.0 GHz (C band)
8.4 GHz (X band)
Jupiter and
its magnetosphere
W50 SNR: SS 433 (accreting neutron star + 0.27c jets)
21 cm HI map
of M33
Centaurus A (the nearest radio galaxy)
PH 227

Radio galaxy
and jets
Radio galaxy
3C286
VLBA
Radio Telescope Arrays
ALMA:
An array of 64 antennas
with 12 meter apertures

maximum baseline: 10 km

35 GHz to 850 GHz