Wavelet Analysis of Differential TEC Measurements Obtained Using LOFAR

Radio interferometers used to make astronomical observations, such as the LOw Frequency ARray (LOFAR), experience distortions imposed upon the received signal due to the ionosphere as well as those from instrumental errors. Calibration using a well-characterized radio source can be used to mitigate these effects and produce more accurate images of astronomical sources, and the calibration process provides measurements of ionospheric conditions over a wide range of length scales. The basic ionospheric measurement this provides is differential Total Electron Content (TEC, the integral of electron density along the line of sight). Differential TEC measurements made using LOFAR have a precision of < 1 mTECu and therefore enable investigation of ionospheric disturbances which may be undetectable to many other methods. We demonstrate an approach to identify ionospheric waves from these data using a wavelet transform and a simple plane wave model. The noise spectra are robustly characterized to provide uncertainty estimates for the fitted parameters. An example is shown in which this method identifies a wave with an amplitude an order of magnitude below those reported using Global Navigation Systems Satellite TEC measurements. Artificially generated data are used to test the accuracy of the method and establish the range of wavelengths which can be detected using this method with LOFAR data. This technique will enable the use of a large and mostly unexplored data set to study traveling ionospheric disturbances over Europe

1-arcsecond imaging strategy for the LoTSS survey using the International LOFAR Telescope

We present the first wide area (2.5 x 2.5 square degrees), deep (median noise of approximately 80 microJy per beam) LOFAR High Band Antenna image at a resolution of 1.2 arcseconds by 2 arcseconds. It was generated from an 8-hour International LOFAR Telescope (ILT) observation of the ELAIS-N1 field at frequencies ranging from 120 to 168 MHz with the most up-to-date ILT imaging strategy. This intermediate resolution falls between the highest possible resolution (0.3 arcseconds) achievable by using all International LOFAR Telescope (ILT) baselines and the standard 6-arcsecond resolution in the LoTSS (LOFAR Two-meter Sky Survey) image products utilizing the LOFAR Dutch baselines only. This is the first demonstration of the feasibility of approximately 1 arcsecond imaging using the ILT, providing unique information on source morphology at scales below the surface brightness limits of higher resolutions. The total calibration and imaging time is approximately 52,000 core hours, nearly five times more than producing a 6-arcsecond image. We also present a radio source catalog containing 2263 sources detected over the 2.5 x 2.5 square degrees image of the ELAIS-N1 field, with a peak intensity threshold of 5.5 sigma. The catalog has been cross-matched with the LoTSS deep ELAIS-N1 field radio catalog, and its flux density and positional accuracy have been investigated and corrected accordingly. We find that approximately 80% of sources that we expect to be detectable based on their peak brightness in the LoTSS 6-arcsecond image are detected in this image, which is approximately a factor of two higher than for 0.3 arcsecond imaging in the Lockman Hole, implying there is a wealth of information on these intermediate scales.Comment: Submitted to A&

Realising the LOFAR Two-Metre Sky Survey

The new generation of high-resolution broad-band radio telescopes, like the Low Frequency Array (LOFAR), produces, depending on the level of compression, between 1 to 10 TB of data per hour after correlation. Such a large amount of scientific data demand powerful computing resources and efficient data handling strategies to be mastered. The LOFAR Two-metre Sky Survey (LoTSS) is a Key Science Project (KSP) of the LOFAR telescope. It aims to map the entire northern hemisphere at unprecedented sensitivity and resolution. The survey consist of 3 168 pointings, requiring about 30 PBytes of storage space. As a member of the German Long Wavelength Consortium (GLOW) the Forschungszentrum Jülich (FZJ) stores in the Long Term Archive (LTA) about 50% of all LoTSS observations conducted to date. In collaboration with SURFsara in Amsterdam we developed service tools that enables the KSP to process LOFAR data stored in the LTA at the Jülich Supercomputing Centre (JSC) in an automated and robust fashion. Through our system more than 500 out of 800 existing LoTSS observationshave already been processed with the prefactor pipeline. This pipeline calibrates the direction-independent instrumental and ionospheric effects and furthermore reduces the data size significantly. For continuum imaging, this processing pipeline is the standard pipeline that is executed before more advanced processing and image reconstruction methods are applied

Unmasking the history of 3C 293 with LOFAR sub-arcsecond imaging

Active galactic nuclei show episodic activity, which can be evident in galaxies that exhibit restarted radio jets. These restarted jets can interact with their environment, leaving signatures on the radio spectral energy distribution. Tracing these signatures is a powerful way to explore the life of radio galaxies. This requires resolved spectral index measurements over a broad frequency range including low frequencies. We present such a study for the radio galaxy 3C 293, which has long been thought to be a restarted galaxy on the basis of its radio morphology. Using the International LOFAR telescope (ILT) we probed spatial scales as fine as ∼0.2″ at 144 MHz, and to constrain the spectrum we combined these data with Multi-Element Radio Linked Interferometer Network and Very Large Array archival data at frequencies up to 8.4 GHz that have a comparable resolution. In the inner lobes (∼2 kpc), we detect the presence of a spectral turnover that peaks at ∼225 MHz and is most likely caused by free-free absorption from the rich surrounding medium. We confirm that these inner lobes are part of a jet-dominated young radio source (spectral age ≤ 0.17 Myr), which is strongly interacting with the rich interstellar medium of the host galaxy. The diffuse emission surrounding these lobes on scales of up to ∼4.5 kpc shows steeper spectral indices (Δα ∼ 0.2-0.5, S ∝ ν-α) and a spectral age of ≤ 0.27 Myr. The outer lobes (extending up to ∼100 kpc) have a spectral index of α ∼ 0.6-0.8 from 144-4850 MHz with a remarkably uniform spatial distribution and only mild spectral curvature (Δα ≤ 0.2). We propose that intermittent fuelling and jet flow disruptions are powering the mechanisms that keep the spectral index in the outer lobes from steepening and maintain the spatial uniformity of the spectral index. Overall, it appears that 3C 293 has gone through multiple (two to three) epochs of activity. This study adds 3C 293 to the new sub-group of restarted galaxies with short interruption time periods. This is the first time a spatially resolved study has been performed that simultaneously studies a young source as well as the older outer lobes at such low frequencies. This illustrates the potential of the International LOFAR telescope to expand such studies to a larger sample of radio galaxies

3C293 high and low resolution maps

VizieR online Data Catalogue associated with article published in journal Astronomy & Astrophysics with title 'Unmasking the history of 3C 293 with LOFAR sub-arcsecond imaging.' (bibcode: 2022A&A...658A...6K

Sub-arcsecond imaging with the International LOFAR Telescope II. Completion of the LOFAR Long-Baseline Calibrator Survey

The Low-Frequency Array (LOFAR) Long-Baseline Calibrator Survey (LBCS) was conducted between 2014 and 2019 in order to obtain a set of suitable calibrators for the LOFAR array. In this paper, we present the complete survey, building on the preliminary analysis published in 2016 which covered approximately half the survey area. The final catalogue consists of 30 006 observations of 24 713 sources in the northern sky, selected for a combination of high low-frequency radio flux density and flat spectral index using existing surveys (WENSS, NVSS, VLSS, and MSSS). Approximately one calibrator per square degree, suitable for calibration of ≥200 km baselines is identified by the detection of compact flux density, for declinations north of 30° and away from the Galactic plane, with a considerably lower density south of this point due to relative difficulty in selecting flat-spectrum candidate sources in this area of the sky. The catalogue contains indicators of degree of correlated flux on baselines between the Dutch core and each of the international stations, involving a maximum baseline length of nearly 2000 km, for all of the observations. Use of the VLBA calibrator list, together with statistical arguments by comparison with flux densities from lower-resolution catalogues, allow us to establish a rough flux density scale for the LBCS observations, so that LBCS statistics can be used to estimate compact flux densities on scales between 300 mas and 2′′, for sources observed in the survey. The survey is used to estimate the phase coherence time of the ionosphere for the LOFAR international baselines, with median phase coherence times of about 2 min varying by a few tens of percent between theshortest and longest baselines. The LBCS can be used to assess the structures of point sources in lower-resolution surveys, with significant reductions in the degree of coherence in these sources on scales between 2′′ and 300 mas. The LBCS survey sources show a greater incidence of compact flux density in quasars than in radio galaxies, consistent with unified schemes of radio sources. Comparison with samples of sources from interplanetary scintillation (IPS) studies with the Murchison Widefield Array shows consistent patterns of detection of compact structure in sources observed both interferometrically with LOFAR and using IPS