News

European and US radio astronomers have demonstrated a new way of observing the Universe - through the Internet! Using cutting-edge technology, the researchers have managed to observe a distant star by using the world's research networks to create a giant virtual telescope. The process has allowed them to image the object with unprecedented detail, in real-time; something which only a few years ago would have been impossible. The star chosen for this remarkable demonstration, called IRC+10420, is one of the most unusual in the sky. Surrounded by clouds of dusty gas and emitting strongly in radio waves, the object is poised at the end of its life, heading toward a cataclysmic explosion known as a 'supernova'.

The first VLBI science demonstrations took place 22 Sep 2004 with four telescopes of the EVN observing spectral line sources. The data has already been made public.

The first ever real-time European “eVLBI” image was produced at JIVE in Dwingeloo on 28 April. Signals from three radio telescopes of the European VLBI Network (EVN) were sent directly via fibre networks into the Data Processor at JIVE and correlated, without the data at any time having been stored on disk. This is called “eVLBI”: a technique to link the telescopes together through an electronic network. eVLBI has the potential to realise much higher data rates, and make data analysis in real time a possibility. In other words: live images from the edge of the Universe can be obtained.

The first European VLBI image was produced Friday 16 January 2004 at JIVE, from data transferred only 24 hours earlier. The image, as well as more detailed information about this latest VLBI success, can be found at the following EVN VLBI map page.

On 28th November 2003, data from Westerbork and Jodrell Bank were streamed directly from the VLBI formatter to Mk5 disks at JIVE at 64 Mbps, without local buffering.

During a recent (November 7) experiment, a single scan of Westerbork data was sent directly to JIVE via the Wb-JIVE optical-fibre, where it was recorded on a Mark5 unit. The same data were also recorded on tape at Westerbork. Last week the tape and disk data were correlated, giving good confidence that the remote recording was good. Final confirmation was achieved when the Westerbork disk was correlated with Effelsberg data - The data recording rate was 256Mb/s

The EVN MkIV Data Processor at JIVE has achieved quarter-second integrations using the whole correlator. This improvement is the first step along the way to the Post-Correlator Integrator and recirculation.