This report summarizes information about the Svetloe Radio Astronomical Observatory activities in 2012. Last year, a number of changes took place in the observatory to improve some technical characteristics and to upgrade some units to their required status. The report provides an overview of current geodetic VLBI activities and gives an outlook for the future

Rahimov, Ismail

Smolentsev, Sergey

NASA Technical Reports Server

Svetloe Station Institute of Applied Astronomy of Russian Academy of Sciences
Svetloe Radio Astronomical Observatory
Sergey Smolentsev, Ismail Rahimov
Abstract
This report summarizes information about the Svetloe Radio Astronomical Observatory activities
in 2012. Last year, a number of changes took place in the observatory to improve some technical
characteristics and to upgrade some units to their required status. The report provides an overview of
current geodetic VLBI activities and gives an outlook for the future.
1. General Information
The Svetloe Radio Astronomical Observatory (Figure 1) was created by the Institute of Applied
Astronomy (IAA) as the first station of the Russian VLBI network QUASAR [1].
The sponsoring organization of the project is the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS). The
Svetloe Radio Astronomical Observatory is situated near the village Svetloe, in the Priozersky
district, Leningrad Region (Table 1). The geographic location of the observatory is shown on the
IAA RAS Website: http://www.ipa.nw.ru/PAGE/rusipa.htm. The main instruments of the obser-
vatory are the 32-m radio telescope equipped with special technical systems for VLBI observations,
GPS/GLONASS/Galileo receivers, and the SLR system.
Figure 1. Svetloe observatory.
146 IVS 2012 Annual Report
https://ntrs.nasa.gov/search.jsp?R=20150003873 2019-08-31T11:14:03+00:00Z
Institute of Applied Astronomy of Russian Academy of Sciences Svetloe Station
Table 1. Svetloe Observatory location and address.
Longitude 29◦47′
Latitude 60◦32′
Leningrad region, Priozerski district
188833 Russia
rahimov@osvtl.spb.ru
2. Technical Staff
Prof. Ismail Rahimov — the head of the observatory,
Vladimir Tarasov — the chief engineer,
Tatiana Andreeva — the engineer, and
Andrey Mikhailov — FS, pointing system control specialist.
3. Technical and Scientific Information
Table 2. Technical parameters of the radio telescope.
Year of construction 2000
Mount AZEL
Azimuth range ±270◦ (from south)
Elevation range from −5◦ to 95◦
Maximum azimuth *
- velocity 0.83 ◦/s
- tracking velocity 2.5 ′/s
- acceleration 12.0 ′/s2
Maximum elevation *
- velocity 0.5 ◦/s
- tracking velocity 0.8 ′/s
- acceleration 12.0 ′/s2
Pointing accuracy better than 10′′
Configuration Cassegrain (with asymmetrical subreflector)
Main reflector diameter 32 m
Subreflector diameter 4 m
Focal length 11.4 m
Main reflector shape quasi-paraboloid
Subreflector shape quasi-hyperboloid
Main reflector surface accuracy ± 0.5 mm
Frequency range 1.4–22 GHz
Axis offset * 5.5± 2.0 mm
* These values were changed to optimize the performance of the antenna system. The axis
offset was measured in summer 2011 by geodesist Andrey Shamov.
IVS 2012 Annual Report 147
Svetloe Station Institute of Applied Astronomy of Russian Academy of Sciences
4. Co-location of VLBI, GPS/GLONASS, and SLR System
The Topcon GPS/GLONASS/Galileo receiver with meteo station WXT-510 is in operation
(Figure 2).
 
Figure 2. Topcon GPS/GLONASS/Galileo receiver at Svetloe observatory.
The SLR system “Sazhen-TM” (Figure 3) was mounted in October 2011 and joined ILRS in
March 2012.
The technical characteristics of the system are presented in Table 3.
Figure 3. “Sazhen-TM” SLR system at Svetloe observatory.
5. Current Status and Activities
The Svetloe observatory participates in IVS and domestic VLBI observing programs. In 2012,
Svetloe station participated in 28 diurnal IVS-R4, IVS-T2, and EURO sessions and in 18 IVS
Intensive sessions.
148 IVS 2012 Annual Report
Institute of Applied Astronomy of Russian Academy of Sciences Svetloe Station
Table 3. Technical parameters of the SLR system “Sazhen-TM”.
Ranging distance, day 400-6000 km
Ranging distance, night 400-23000 km
Aperture 25 cm
Wavelength 532 nm
Beam divergence 12′′
Laser pulse frequency 300 Hz
Pulse energy 2.5 mJ
Mass 170 kg
Normal points precision 1 cm
Angular precision 1-2′′
Svetloe participated in 47 diurnal sessions of the domestic Ru-E program for determining all
Earth orientation parameters, and in 36 one-hour Ru-U sessions to obtain Universal Time using
e-VLBI data transfer.
6. Outlook
We have the following plans for the coming year:
• To participate in IVS observations
• To carry out domestic observing programs to obtain Universal Time with e-VLBI data trans-
fer and Earth orientation parameters once a week
• To carry out SLR observations of geodetic and navigation satellites
• To participate in EVN and RADIOASTRON observing sessions
• To continue geodetic monitoring of the antenna parameters.
References
[1] Finkelstein A., Ipatov A., Smolentsev S. The Network “Quasar”: 2008-2011 // “Measuring the fu-
ture”, Proceedings of the Fifth IVS General Meeting, A. Finkelstein, D. Behrend (eds.), St. Petersburg,
“Nauka”, 2008. pp. 39–46.
IVS 2012 Annual Report 149


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