Searching for Pulsars with FAST
Mentor 1
David Kaplan
Location
Union Wisconsin Room
Start Date
27-4-2018 1:00 PM
Description
Pulsars are rapidly rotating neutron stars with intense magnetic fields and a regular emission of bright radio waves. The radio emission of pulsars is so consistent—like lighthouses in space—that they can be timed precisely like an atomic clock and used to detect gravitational waves, which is the goal of the North American Nanohertz Observatory for Gravitational Waves (NANOGrav). Along with Shana Li from Oberlin College, I traveled to China to conduct Pulsar Astronomy research and data processing with the National Astronomical Observatories of China (NAOC). We studied how to process raw pulsar data collected from large radio telescopes, including Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico, the Parkes Radio Telescope in Australia, and the new Five Hundred Meter Aperture Spherical Radio Telescope (FAST) in Guiyang, China. We worked to develop a functioning pulsar-search pipeline for NAOC and the new FAST telescope. This project aids the commissioning of FAST, and contributes to NANOGrav’s pulsar timing array.
Searching for Pulsars with FAST
Union Wisconsin Room
Pulsars are rapidly rotating neutron stars with intense magnetic fields and a regular emission of bright radio waves. The radio emission of pulsars is so consistent—like lighthouses in space—that they can be timed precisely like an atomic clock and used to detect gravitational waves, which is the goal of the North American Nanohertz Observatory for Gravitational Waves (NANOGrav). Along with Shana Li from Oberlin College, I traveled to China to conduct Pulsar Astronomy research and data processing with the National Astronomical Observatories of China (NAOC). We studied how to process raw pulsar data collected from large radio telescopes, including Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico, the Parkes Radio Telescope in Australia, and the new Five Hundred Meter Aperture Spherical Radio Telescope (FAST) in Guiyang, China. We worked to develop a functioning pulsar-search pipeline for NAOC and the new FAST telescope. This project aids the commissioning of FAST, and contributes to NANOGrav’s pulsar timing array.
