Radio interferometry and its application in unit antenna arrays enable sensitive research on celestial bodies, with angular resolution comparable to or even surpassing optical imaging with wavelengths thousands of times shorter. Aperture synthesis technology can improve angular resolution, mainly by effectively creating telescopes with the same maximum spacing between array elements.
Recently, Yoshiharu Asaki and others from the Atacama Large Millimeter Wave Interferometer Array (ALMA) published a paper in Nature Reviews Methods Primers, introducing a radio interferometry measurement system that receives cosmic electromagnetic signals at sub millimeter to meter wavelengths.
Firstly, the concept of synthetic aperture, basic instrument components, and data calibration were described, and an overview of the currently operating astronomical arrays was provided. Described the process of image synthesis and the factors that need to be considered when generating radio astronomy images, and introduced commonly used data formats and software applications for processing observational data. Outlined various factors that limit array functionality and/or optimization. Finally, future plans for radio interferometry measurements were proposed to initiate the next phase.
Figure 1: The (u, v) plane of a radio interference array.
Figure 2: A simple astronomical radio interferometer.
Figure 3: Synthetic imaging of the actual interferometric array of the Atacama large millimeter/submillimeter array.
Figure 4: Synthetic imaging with clean deconvolution (robustness weighting with a robustness parameter of 1.0).
Figure 5: Interference image of celestial bodies.
Editor: Sichuan Jinzhongde Science and Technology Research Institute
Source: Today's New Materials
