22–25 Mar 2010
University of Manchester
Europe/London timezone
SKA 2010 Science and Engineering meeting

Ultra-high dynamic range WSRT 1.4 GHz polarization observations of the Perseus cluster

25 Mar 2010, 16:45
15m
Whitworth Hall (University of Manchester)

Whitworth Hall

University of Manchester

Oxford street Manchester M139PL
Science from the Pathfinders and the Route to the SKA Contributed Science Talks

Speaker

Prof. Ger de Bruyn (ASTRON)

Description

We will present recent WSRT 21cm continuum observations of both discrete and diffuse sources of polarized emission seen in and towards the Perseus cluster of galaxies. The calibration of the data was done using Newstar and used both peeling, internal polarization leakage calibration and closure error correction. All this had to be done with sub-MHz frequency resolution to combat frequency structure in the telescope primary beam. The image dynamic range, on-axis and off-axis, exceeds 10^6 and almost noise limited imaging at 10 microJy levels per beam is achieved. Faraday spectra of background sources seen through the (periphery of the) cluster reveal unusually high RM, probably indicating ordered large-scale cluster magnetic fields and possibly the presence of a significant gaseous component in the Warm Intergalactic Medium. The diffuse Galactic polarized foreground is going to be a rich source of information, as well as a significant contaminant for background source studies, in SKA 1.4 GHz work at 15" and higher resolution.

Primary author

Prof. Ger de Bruyn (ASTRON)

Co-author

Dr Michiel Brentjens (ASTRON)

Presentation materials