225 research outputs found
e-MERLIN observations of the puzzling TeV source HESS J1943+213
HESS J1943+213 is a TeV source close to the Galactic plane proposed to be a
BL Lac object. Our high resolution EVN observation failed to recover two thirds
of the source flux density detected simultaneously by the WSRT. Our recent
e-MERLIN observations in L and C bands show only a point source with flux
density comparable to the EVN detection. Thus the structure responsible for the
missing flux density has to be larger than 2". It may be related to the
presumed extragalactic source (thus would have a kpc-scale size), or to the
Galactic foreground material close to the line of sight to the source.Comment: 4 pages, 1 figure, appears in the proceedings of the 12th European
VLBI Network Symposium and Users Meeting (7-10 October 2014, Cagliari,
Italy), eds. A. Tarchi, M. Giroletti & L. Feretti. Proceedings of Science,
PoS(EVN 2014)07
Probing the Nature of Ultra-Steep Spectrum Radio Sources
Here we present, first results from e-VLBI observations at 18 cm on a small sample of ultra-steep spectrum sources (spectral index between 74 MHz and 325 MH
VLBI search for the radio counterpart of HESS J1943+213
HESS J1943+213, a TeV point source close to the Galactic plane recently
discovered by the H.E.S.S. collaboration, was proposed to be an extreme BL
Lacertae object, though a pulsar wind nebula (PWN) nature could not be
completely discarded. To investigate its nature, we performed high-resolution
radio observations with the European Very Long Baseline Interferometry Network
(EVN) and reanalyzed archival continuum and H {\sc i} data. The EVN
observations revealed a compact radio counterpart of the TeV source. The low
brightness temperature and the resolved nature of the radio source are
indications against the beamed BL Lacertae hypothesis. The radio/X-ray source
appears immersed in a 1\arcmin elliptical feature suggesting a possible
galactic origin (PWN nature) for the HESS source. We found that HESS\,J1943+213
is located in the interior of a \sim1\degr diameter H {\sc i} feature, and
explored the possibility of they being physically related.Comment: Significantly revised and extended. Accepted for publication in ApJ
(ApJ, 762, 63). (4 figures.
Is an obscured AGN at the centre of the disk galaxy IC 2497 responsible for Hanny's Voorwerp?
We present the results of VLBI and MERLIN observations of the massive disk
galaxy IC 2497. Optical observations of IC 2497 revealed the existence of a
giant emission nebula "Hanny's Voorwerp" in the proximity of the galaxy.
Earlier short-track 18 cm observations with e-VLBI at 18 cm, detected a compact
radio component (C1) at the centre of IC 2497. The brightness temperature of C1
was measured to be greater than 4E5 K. Deeper, long-track e-VLBI observations
presented here, re-confirm the existence of C1 but also reveal the existence of
a second compact component (C2) located about 230 milliarcseconds to the
North-East of C1. The brightness temperature of C2 is measured to be greater
than 1.4E5 K, suggesting that both components may be related to AGN activity
(e.g. a radio core and jet hotspot). Lower resolution 18cm MERLIN observations
show both components. C1 is shown to be compact with a slight elongation along
the direction of Hanny's Voorwerp, and C2 shows a lot of extended emission in
an almost perpendicular direction to the direction of the Voorwerp. Our results
continue to support the hypothesis that IC 2497 contains an Active Galactic
Nucleus (AGN), and that a jet associated with this AGN clears a path that
permits ionising radiation from the AGN to directly illuminate the emission
nebula.Comment: Presented at The 8th International e-VLBI Workshop: the Science and
Technology of Long Baseline Real-Time Interferometry, EXPReS09, June 22-26
2009 Madrid, Spain. 5 pages, 5 article
Density-based one-dimensional model potentials for strong-field simulations in , and
We present results on the accurate one-dimensional (1D) modeling of simple
atomic and molecular systems excited by strong laser fields. We use atomic
model potentials that we derive from the corrections proposed earlier using the
reduced ground state density of a three-dimensional (3D) single-active electron
atom. The correction involves a change of the asymptotics of the 1D Coulomb
model potentials while maintaining the correct ground state energy. We present
three different applications of this method: we construct correct 1D models of
the hydrogen molecular ion, the helium atom and the hydrogen molecule using
improved parameters of existing soft-core Coulomb potential forms. We test
these 1D models by comparing the corresponding numerical simulation results
with their 3D counterparts in typical strong-field physics scenarios with near-
and mid-infrared laser pulses, having peak intensities in the
range, and we find an impressively increased
accuracy in the dynamics of the most important atomic quantities on the time
scale of the excitation. We also present the high-order harmonic spectra of the
He atom, computed using our 1D atomic model potentials. They show a very good
match with the structure and phase obtained from the 3D simulations in an
experimentally important range of excitation amplitudes
Discovery of circularly polarised radio emission from SS 433
We report the discovery of circularly polarised radio emission from the
radio-jet X-ray binary SS 433 with the Australia Telescope Compact Array. The
flux density spectrum of the circular polarization, clearly detected at four
frequencies between 1 - 9 GHz, has a spectral index of (-0.9 +/- 0.1). Multiple
components in the source and a lack of very high spatial resolution do not
allow a unique determination of the origin of the circular polarization, nor of
the spectrum of fractional polarization. However, we argue that the emission is
likely to arise in the inner regions of the binary, possibly via
propagation-induced conversion of linear to circular polarization, and the
fractional circular polarization of these regions may be as high as 10%.
Observations such as these have the potential to investigate the composition,
whether pairs or baryonic, of the ejecta from X-ray binaries.Comment: Accepted for publication in ApJ Letter
VLBI imaging of extremely high redshift quasars at 5 GHz
We present very long baseline interferometry (VLBI) images of ten very high
redshift (z>3) quasars at 5 GHz. The sources 0004+139, 0830+101, 0906+041,
0938+119 and 1500+045 were observed in September 1992 using a global VLBI
array, while 0046+063, 0243+181, 1338+381, 1428+423 and 1557+032 were observed
in October 1996 with the European VLBI Network and Hartebeesthoek, South
Africa. Most of the sources are resolved and show asymmetric structure. The
sample includes 1428+423, the most distant radio loud quasar known to date
(z=4.72). It is barely resolved with an angular resolution of about 2.0*1.4
mas.Comment: Astronomy and Astrophysics, in press, Latex2e, 10 pages, 3 figures
(and lots of sub-figures
A close-pair binary in a distant triple supermassive black-hole system
Galaxies are believed to evolve through merging, which should lead to
multiple supermassive black holes in some. There are four known triple black
hole systems, with the closest pair being 2.4 kiloparsecs apart (the third
component is more distant at 3 kiloparsecs), which is far from the
gravitational sphere of influence of a black hole with mass 10
M (about 100 parsecs). Previous searches for compact black hole systems
concluded that they were rare, with the tightest binary system having a
separation of 7 parsecs. Here we report observations of a triple black hole
system at redshift z=0.39, with the closest pair separated by 140
parsecs. The presence of the tight pair is imprinted onto the properties of the
large-scale radio jets, as a rotationally-symmetric helical modulation, which
provides a useful way to search for other tight pairs without needing extremely
high resolution observations. As we found this tight pair after searching only
six galaxies, we conclude that tight pairs are more common than hitherto
believed, which is an important observational constraint for low-frequency
gravitational wave experiments.Comment: 21 pages, 6 figures. Published online by Nature on 25 June 2014.
Extremely minor differences with published version exis
Late Emission from the Type Ib/c SN 2001em: Overtaking the Hydrogen Envelope
The Type Ib/c supernova SN 2001em was observed to have strong radio, X-ray,
and Halpha emission at an age of about 2.5 yr. Although the radio and X-ray
emission have been attributed to an off-axis gamma-ray burst, we model the
emission as the interaction of normal SN Ib/c ejecta with a dense, massive (3
Msun) circumstellar shell at a distance about 7 x 10^{16} cm. We investigate
two models, in which the circumstellar shell has or has not been overtaken by
the forward shock at the time of the X-ray observation. The circumstellar shell
was presumably formed by vigorous mass loss with a rate (2-10) x 10^{-3}
Msun/yr at 1000-2000 yr prior to the supernova explosion. The hydrogen envelope
was completely lost, and subsequently was swept up and accelerated by the fast
wind of the presupernova star up to a velocity of 30-50 km/s. Although
interaction with the shell can explain most of the late emission properties of
SN 2001em, we need to invoke clumping of the gas to explain the low absorption
at X-ray and radio wavelengths.Comment: 26 pages, 4 figures, ApJ submitte
SN 2007gr: a Normal Type Ic Supernova with a Mildly Relativistic Radio Jet?
A nearby type Ic supernova, SN 2007gr was observed with the EVN in two epochs 60 days apart (second observation also included the Green Bank Telescope). In both cases one of the EVN stations was the Westerbork Synthesis Radio Telescope (WSRT), which recorded the observational data not only in the VLBI mode, but also in its normal interferometric mode. Thus it provided an important reference observation. In the first epoch the fluxes measured by the VLBI network and the WSRT alone match well. However in the second epoch the peak brightness observed in the VLBI experiment is much lower than the total flux recorded by the WSRT. There could be multiple reasons for this discrepancy: a resolution effect, coherence losses in VLBI, or extended emission contaminating the WSRT measurement. With new WSRT observations we costrain the level of background emission and find that there is still a difference between the corrected total flux density and the VLBI peak brightness. If one assumes that this is dominated by resolution, this would correspond to an average apparent expansion speed of ~0.4c
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