4 research outputs found

    Searching for Pulsars Using the Long Wavelength Array Telescope

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    Radio pulsars are fascinating celestial objects known to display both periodic and transient behavior. Pulsars are characterized by narrow electromagnetic radiation beams which restrict the number of pulsars visible from Earth due to the necessary alignment of the radiation beam across an observer’s line of sight. Pulsars are useful tools for a broad range of applications and provide important information about the process of stellar evolution, tests for relativistic theories of gravity and the search for low-frequency gravitational waves. Over 2,500 pulsars have been observed since their initial discovery in 1967 but the search for these objects is continuously warranted. Most pulsar discoveries rely on high time resolution and large collecting area telescopes, and long on-sky observations. In this thesis, I present results from the LWA1 Northern Celestial Cap (LNCC) pulsar survey using the Long Wavelength Array Telescope in New Mexico and discuss the challenges and opportunities. The LNCC survey is the first part of the LWA1 all sky pulsar/radio transient survey and it is focused on the least explored region of the sky: the northern celestial pole with focus on pulsars. The LNCC is one of the first large-scale pulsar surveys at low frequencies using 30 MHz to 62 MHz. Each of 320 positions in the sky have been tracked using a single beam for one hour per position. Using a pipeline that I co-developed, I processed some of the data using LoneStar5, one of the supercomputers at the Texas Advanced Computing Center. Known pulsars redetected are part of the LWA1 Pulsar Archive and are listed in this thesis

    The NANOGrav 12.5 yr Data Set: Observations and Narrowband Timing of 47 Millisecond Pulsars

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    We present time-of-arrival (TOA) measurements and timing models of 47 millisecond pulsars observed from 2004 to 2017 at the Arecibo Observatory and the Green Bank Telescope by the North American Nanohertz Observatory for Gravitational Waves (NANOGrav). The observing cadence was three to four weeks for most pulsars over most of this time span, with weekly observations of six sources. These data were collected for use in low-frequency gravitational wave searches and for other astrophysical purposes. We detail our observational methods and present a set of TOA measurements, based on narrowband analysis, in which many TOAs are calculated within narrow radio-frequency bands for data collected simultaneously across a wide bandwidth. A separate set of wideband TOAs will be presented in a companion paper. We detail a number of methodological changes, compared to our previous work, which yield a cleaner and more uniformly processed data set. Our timing models include several new astrometric and binary pulsar measurements, including previously unpublished values for the parallaxes of PSRs J1832−0836 and J2322+2057, the secular derivatives of the projected semimajor orbital axes of PSRs J0613−0200 and J2229+2643, and the first detection of the Shapiro delay in PSR J2145−0750. We report detectable levels of red noise in the time series for 14 pulsars. As a check on timing model reliability, we investigate the stability of astrometric parameters across data sets of different lengths. We also report flux density measurements for all pulsars observed. Searches for stochastic and continuous gravitational waves using these data will be subjects of forthcoming publications

    The NANOGrav 12.5 yr Data Set: Observations and narrowband timing of 47 millisecond pulsars

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    We present time-of-arrival (TOA) measurements and timing models of 47 millisecond pulsars observed from 2004 to 2017 at the Arecibo Observatory and the Green Bank Telescope by the North American Nanohertz Observatory for Gravitational Waves (NANOGrav). The observing cadence was three to four weeks for most pulsars over most of this time span, with weekly observations of six sources. These data were collected for use in low-frequency gravitational wave searches and for other astrophysical purposes. We detail our observational methods and present a set of TOA measurements, based on "narrowband"analysis, in which many TOAs are calculated within narrow radio-frequency bands for data collected simultaneously across a wide bandwidth. A separate set of "wideband"TOAs will be presented in a companion paper. We detail a number of methodological changes, compared to our previous work, which yield a cleaner and more uniformly processed data set. Our timing models include several new astrometric and binary pulsar measurements, including previously unpublished values for the parallaxes of PSRs J1832-0836 and J2322+2057, the secular derivatives of the projected semimajor orbital axes of PSRs J0613-0200 and J2229+2643, and the first detection of the Shapiro delay in PSR J2145-0750. We report detectable levels of red noise in the time series for 14 pulsars. As a check on timing model reliability, we investigate the stability of astrometric parameters across data sets of different lengths. We also report flux density measurements for all pulsars observed. Searches for stochastic and continuous gravitational waves using these data will be subjects of forthcoming publications

    The NANOGrav 12.5 yr Data Set: Wideband Timing of 47 Millisecond Pulsars

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    We present a new analysis of the profile data from the 47 millisecond pulsars comprising the 12.5 yr data set of the North American Nanohertz Observatory for Gravitational Waves, which is presented in a parallel paper (Alam et al., hereafter NG12.5). Our reprocessing is performed using "wideband"timing methods, which use frequency-dependent template profiles, simultaneous time-of-arrival (TOA) and dispersion measure (DM) measurements from broadband observations, and novel analysis techniques. In particular, the wideband DM measurements are used to constrain the DM portion of the timing model. We compare the ensemble timing results to those in NG12.5 by examining the timing residuals, timing models, and noise-model components. There is a remarkable level of agreement across all metrics considered. Our best-timed pulsars produce encouragingly similar results to those from NG12.5. In certain cases, such as high-DM pulsars with profile broadening or sources that are weak and scintillating, wideband timing techniques prove to be beneficial, leading to more precise timing model parameters by 10%-15%. The high-precision, multiband measurements of several pulsars indicate frequency-dependent DMs. Compared to the narrowband analysis in NG12.5, the TOA volume is reduced by a factor of 33, which may ultimately facilitate computational speed-ups for complex pulsar timing array analyses. This first wideband pulsar timing data set is a stepping stone, and its consistent results with NG12.5 assure us that such data sets are appropriate for gravitational wave analyses
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