Synthesis Imaging and the Navy Prototype Optical Interferometer

Christian Hummel (US Naval Observatory)
David Mozurkewich (Naval Research Laboratory)
Tom Pauls (Naval Research Laboratory)

Abstract:

The talk on observing strategy with NPOI will introduce the students to challenges of planning and reducing observations with a 6-station array. These challenges include handling sub-arrays, editing non-tracking stations, data quality control, bias corrections, and calibration. In the afternoon, students will have the opportunity to use the standard NPOI IDL-based data reduction software OYSTER to reduce a data set of the triple star Eta Virginis. This session will also include imaging the data with the aips++ software package.

The Navy Prototype Optical Interferometer - David Mozurkewich (NRL)
Viewgraphs PDF 1880k Bytes.
Viewgraphs PDF 64M Bytes.
A note on the use of Summer School material.

Observing strategy with NPOI - Christian Hummel (USNO)
Viewgraphs PDF 528k Bytes.

Lab session on NPOI data reduction and imaging - Christian Hummel (USNO)
see the Oyster Homepage for lab software and instructions.

The NPOI afternoon lab session will be divided into two parts (separated by coffee): the first part will be OYSTER data reduction, the second one aips++ imaging.

Suggested Reading:

• The Navy Prototype Optical Interferometer
  J.T. Armstrong, D. Mozurkewich, L.J. Rickard, D.J. Hutter, J.A. Benson, P.F. Bowers, N.M. Elias II, C.A. Hummel, K.J. Johnston, D.F. Buscher, J.H. Clark III, L. Ha, L.-C. Ling, N.M. White, and R.S. Simon
  Astrophys. J. 496, 550 (1998).

Data reduction overview:

• Orbital and stellar parameters of Omicron Leonis from spectroscopy and interferometry
  C.A. Hummel, J.-M. Carquillat, N. Ginestet, R.F. Griffin, A.F. Boden, A.R. Hajian, D. Mozurkewich, T.E. Nordgren
  Astron. J. 121, 1623 (2000).

Bias correction:

• Direct multi-wavelength limb-darkening measurements of three late-type giants with the Navy Prototype Optical Interferometer
  M. Wittkowski, C.A. Hummel, K.J. Johnston, D. Mozurkewich, A.R. Hajian, N.M. White
  Astron. Astrophys. 377, 981 (2001).

Interferometric imaging:

• Image formation by self-calibration in radio astronomy
  T.J. Pearson and A.C.S. Readhead
  Ann. Rev. Astron. Astrophys. 22, 97 (1984).