Unlocking High-Frequency Astronomy in New Mexico Through Atmospheric Calibration

  • CART Astrophysics Seminar Series

October 15, 2026 2:00 PM - October 15, 2026 3:00 PM
PAIS 3205

Host:
Diana Dragomir
Presenter:
Kyle Massingill (NRAO)
I present on the development of calibrations strategies for the next generation Very Large Array (ngVLA). Temporally variable water vapor in the troposphere layer of the atmosphere will introduce delay error to observations made with ngVLA. Calibration of this delay error is essential to ngVLA meeting science requirements especially at higher frequencies (30-116 GHz). A water vapor radiometer (WVR) system is being developed for ngVLA. This system will continually estimate changes in the water vapor column density in the main antenna beam, which can then be corrected for using radio frequency adaptive optics style techniques. I describe some of the unique science ngVLA will be able to pursue using these tools. I give updates on our use of radiometers at the VLA site, and on our approach to using atmospheric modeling to retrieve water vapor measurements from WVR observations and predict windows of opportunity for high-frequency observing.

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