We report on the variability of 443 flat-spectrum, compact radio sources monitored using the VLA for 3 days in four epochs at image4 month intervals at 5 GHz as part of the Micro-Arcsecond ...Scintillation-Induced Variability (MASIV) survey. Over half of these sources exhibited 2%-10% rms variations on timescales over 2 days. We analyzed the variations by two independent methods and find that the rms variability amplitudes of the sources correlate with the emission measure in the ionized interstellar medium along their respective lines of sight. We thus link the variations with interstellar scintillation of components of these sources, with some (unknown) fraction of the total flux density contained within a compact region of angular diameter in the range 10-50 muas. We also find that the variations decrease for high mean flux density sources and, most importantly, for high-redshift sources. The decrease in variability is probably due either to an increase in the apparent diameter of the source or to a decrease in the flux density of the compact fraction beyond image. Here we present a statistical analysis of these results, and a future paper will discuss the cosmological implications in detail.
We present simulations of scattering phenomena which are important in pulsar observations, but which are analytically intractable. The simulation code, which has also been used for solar wind and ...atmospheric scattering problems, is available from the authors. These simulations reveal an unexpectedly important role of dispersion in combination with refraction. We demonstrate the effect of analyzing observations which are shorter than the refractive scale. We examine time-of-arrival fluctuations in detail: showing their correlation with intensity and dispersion measure, providing a heuristic model from which one can estimate their contribution to pulsar timing observations, and showing that much of the effect can be corrected making use of measured intensity and dispersion. Finally, we analyze observations of the millisecond pulsar J0437-4715, made with the Parkes radio telescope, that show timing fluctuations which are correlated with intensity. We demonstrate that these timing fluctuations can be corrected, but we find that they are much larger than would be expected from scattering in a homogeneous turbulent plasma with isotropic density fluctuations. We do not have an explanation for these timing fluctuations.
We report a series of observations of the interstellar scintillation (ISS) of the double pulsar J0737-3039 over the course of 18 months. As in earlier work, the basic phenomenon is the variation in ...the ISS caused by the changing transverse velocities of each pulsar, the ionized interstellar medium (IISM), and the Earth. The transverse velocity of the binary system can be determined both by very long baseline interferometry and timing observations. The orbital velocity and inclination is almost completely determined from timing observations, but the direction of the orbital angular momentum is not known. Since the Earth's velocity is known, and can be compared with the orbital velocity by its effect on the timescale of the ISS, we can determine the orientation Omega of the pulsar orbit with respect to equatorial coordinates (Omega = 65 + or - 2degrees). We also resolve the ambiguity (i = 88degrees.7 or 91degrees.3) in the inclination of the orbit deduced from the measured Shapiro delay by our estimate i = 88degrees.1 + or - 0degrees.5. This relies on the analysis of the ISS over both frequency and time, and provides a model for the location, anisotropy, turbulence level, and transverse phase gradient of the IISM. We find that the IISM can be well-modeled during each observation, typically of a few orbital periods, but its turbulence level and mean velocity vary significantly over the 18 months.
Abstract
We investigate the relationship between 5 GHz interstellar scintillation (ISS) and 15 GHz intrinsic variability of compact, radio-selected active galactic nuclei (AGNs) drawn from the ...Microarcsecond Scintillation-Induced Variability (MASIV) Survey and the Owens Valley Radio Observatory blazar monitoring program. We discover that the strongest scintillators at 5 GHz (modulation index, m5 ≥ 0.02) all exhibit strong 15 GHz intrinsic variability (m15 ≥ 0.1). This relationship can be attributed mainly to the mutual dependence of intrinsic variability and ISS amplitudes on radio core compactness at ∼ 100 μas scales, and to a lesser extent, on their mutual dependences on source flux density, arcsec-scale core dominance and redshift. However, not all sources displaying strong intrinsic variations show high amplitude scintillation, since ISS is also strongly dependent on Galactic line-of-sight scattering properties. This observed relationship between intrinsic variability and ISS highlights the importance of optimizing the observing frequency, cadence, timespan and sky coverage of future radio variability surveys, such that these two effects can be better distinguished to study the underlying physics. For the full MASIV sample, we find that Fermi-detected gamma-ray loud sources exhibit significantly higher 5 GHz ISS amplitudes than gamma-ray quiet sources. This relationship is weaker than the known correlation between gamma-ray loudness and the 15 GHz variability amplitudes, most likely due to jet opacity effects.
Interstellar scintillation (ISS), fluctuations in the amplitude and phase of radio waves caused by scattering in the interstellar medium, is important as a diagnostic of interstellar plasma ...turbulence. ISS is also of interest because it is noise for other radio astronomical observations. The unifying concern is the power spectrum of the interstellar electron density. Here we use ISS observations through the nearby (less than or approximately =1 kpc) (ISM) to estimate the spectrum. From measurements of angular broadening of pulsars and extragalactic sources, decorrelation bandwidth of pulsars, refractive steering of features in pulsar dynamic spectra, dispersion measured fluctuations of pulsars, and refractive scintillation index measurements, we construct a composite structure function that is approximately power law over 2 x 10(exp 6) m less than scale less than 10(exp 13) m. The data are consistent with the structure function having a logarithmic slope versus baseline less than 2; thus there is a meaningful connection between scales in the radiowave fluctuation field and the scales in the electron density field causing the scattering. The data give an upper limit to the inner scale, l(sub o) less than or approximately 10(exp 8) m and are consistent with much smaller values. We construct a composite electron density spectrum that is approximately power law over at least the approximately = 5 decade wavenumber range 10(exp -13)/m less than wavenumber less than 10(exp -8)/m and that may extend to higher wavenumbers. The average spectral index of electron density over this wavenumber range is approximately = 3.7, very close to the value expected for a Kolmogorov process. The outer scale size, L(sub o), must be greater than or approximately = 10(exp 13) m (determined from dispersion measure fluctuations). When the ISS data are combined with measurements of differential Faraday rotation angle, and gradients in the average electron density, constraints can be put on the spectrum at much smaller wave numbers. The composite spectrum is consistent with a Kolmogorov-like power law over a huge range (10 or more decades) of spatial wavenumber with an infrared outer scale L(sub o) greater than or approximately 10(exp 18)m. This power-law subrange-expressed as ratio of outer to inner scales-is comparable to or larger than that of other naturally occurring turbulent fluids, such as the oceans or the solar wind. We outline some of the theories for generating and maintaining such a spectrum over this huge wavenumber range.
Interstellar scintillation (ISS), observed as time variation in the intensity of a compact radio source, is caused by small-scale structure in the electron density of the interstellar plasma. Dynamic ...spectra of ISS show modulation in radio frequency and time. Here we relate the (two-dimensional) power spectrum of the dynamic spectrum--the secondary spectrum--to the scattered image of the source. Recent work has identified remarkable parabolic arcs in secondary spectra. Each point in a secondary spectrum corresponds to interference between points in the scattered image with a certain Doppler shift and a certain delay. The parabolic arc corresponds to the quadratic relation between differential Doppler shift and delay through their common dependence on scattering angle. We show that arcs will occur in all media that scatter significant power at angles larger than the rms angle. Thus, effects such as source diameter, steep spectra, and dissipation scales, which truncate high angle scattering, also truncate arcs. Arcs are equally visible in simulations of nondispersive scattering. They are enhanced by anisotropic scattering when the spatial structure is elongated perpendicular to the velocity. In weak scattering the secondary spectrum is directly mapped from the scattered image, and this mapping can be inverted. We discuss additional observed phenomena including multiple arcs and reverse arclets oriented oppositely to the main arc. These phenomena persist for many refractive scattering times, suggesting that they are due to large-scale density structures, rather than low-frequency components of Kolmogorov turbulence.
We have examined the interstellar scintillations of the pulsars in the double-pulsar binary system. Near the time of the eclipse of pulsar A by the magnetosphere of B, the scintillations from both ...pulsars should be highly correlated because the radiation is passing through the same interstellar plasma. We report confirmation of this effect using 820 and 1400 MHz observations made with the Green Bank Telescope. The correlation allows us to constrain the projected relative position of the two pulsars at closest approach to be 4000 plus or minus 2000 km, corresponding to an inclination that is only 0 degree .29 plus or minus 0 degree .14 away from 90 degree . It also produces a two-dimensional map of the spatial correlation of the interstellar scintillation. This shows that the interstellar medium in the direction of the pulsars is significantly anisotropic. When this anisotropy is included in the orbital fitting, the transverse velocity of the center of mass is reduced from the previously published value of 141 plus or minus 8.5 km s super(-1) to 66 plus or minus 15 km s super(-1).
The 4.9 GHz Micro-Arcsecond Scintillation-Induced Variability (MASIV) Survey detected a drop in interstellar scintillation (ISS) for sources at redshifts z 2, indicating an apparent increase in ...angular diameter or a decrease in flux density of the most compact components of these sources relative to their extended emission. This can result from intrinsic source size effects or scatter broadening in the intergalactic medium (IGM) in excess of the expected (1 + z)1/2 angular diameter scaling of brightness temperature limited sources resulting from cosmological expansion. We report here 4.9 GHz and 8.4 GHz observations and data analysis for a sample of 140 compact, flat-spectrum sources which may allow us to determine the origin of this angular diameter-redshift relation by exploiting their different wavelength dependences. In addition to using ISS as a cosmological probe, the observations provide additional insight into source morphologies and the characteristics of ISS. As in the MASIV Survey, the variability of the sources is found to be significantly correlated with line-of-sight H Delta *a intensities, confirming its link with ISS. For 25 sources, time delays of about 0.15-3 days are observed between the scintillation patterns at both frequencies, interpreted as being caused by a shift in core positions when probed at different optical depths. Significant correlation is found between ISS amplitudes and source spectral index; in particular, a large drop in ISS amplitudes is observed at Delta *a < --0.4 confirming that steep spectrum sources scintillate less. We detect a weakened redshift dependence of ISS at 8.4 GHz over that at 4.9 GHz, with the mean variance at four-day timescales reduced by a factor of 1.8 in the z > 2 sources relative to the z < 2 sources, as opposed to the factor of three decrease observed at 4.9 GHz. This suggests scatter broadening in the IGM, but the interpretation is complicated by subtle selection effects that will be explored further in a follow-up paper.
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