A simple but effective modification to the conventional CLEAN algorithm is suggested. This modification ensures both stability and speed when CLEAN is applied to maps containing a mixture of point sources and extended structures. The method has been successfully applied to the recently-completed sky survey at 34.5 MHz (Dwarakanath & Udaya Shankar 1990). This survey was made using the Gauribidanur T array (GEETEE)1 in 1-D aperture synthesis mode. Since in this case the ‘dirty beam’ (point spread function) cannot be directly computed, a method to obtain this is discussed in detail. The results of this deconvolution procedure have been encouraging in terms of reduced computing time and improved dynamic range in our maps. This algorithm should find wider application in deconvolving maps which have both extended structures and point sources

The behaviour of pulsars at low radio-frequencies (below ≈ 50 MHz) remains poorly understood mainly due to very limited observational data on pulsars at these frequencies. We report here our measurements of pulse profiles at 34.5 MHz of 8 pulsars using the Gauribidanur Radio Telescope. None of the 8 pulsars show any significant interpulse emission at this frequency which conflicts with an earlier claim from 25 MHz observations. With the exception of one pulsar (PSR 0943 + 10) all the observed pulsars show turnovers at frequencies above 35 MHz in their spectra. We also report our attempts to study the short and long term variations in the pulsar signals at this low frequency.

We discuss here the design details of an inexpensive programmable Sweeping Local Oscillator System (SLOS) built for use in a ‘swept frequency dedispersion scheme’ for pulsar observations. A useful extension of the basic Divide-and-Add algorithm for frequency synthesis is developed for this purpose. An SLOS based on this design has been built and used for high time-resolution observations of pulsars at low radio-frequencies.

We have looked for and found a possible spatial correlation between the present pulsar distribution and the estimated locations of the spiral arms at earlier epochs. Through a detailed statistical analysis we find a significant correlation between the present distribution of pulsars and the mass distribution (in the spiral arms) expected about 60 Myr ago for a corotation resonance radius of 14kpc. We discuss the implications of this correlation for the minimum mass of the progenitors of pulsars. Interpreting the spread in the locations of pulsars with respect to the past locations of the spiral arms as predominantly due to their space velocities, we derive an average velocity for the pulsar population.

In this paper, we describe pulsar observations at decametric wavelengths using the Gauribidanur Radio Telescope made subsequent to our earlier measurements (Deshpande & Radhakrishnan 1992). To improve the time-resolution in our measurements of pulse profiles, we have used the ‘swept-frequency dedispersion’ method with some modifications to suit its application at such low radio frequencies. We also present a new scheme that simplifies the calibration of the receiver gain characteristics. We present average profiles on four pulsars from these improved measurements at 34.5 MHz.

A detailed statistical analysis of pulsarcurrent is presented. The conclusions reached are the following: (1) The birthrate of pulsars is about one in 75 ± 15 years. (2) There is evidence forinjection of pulsars into the population of solitary pulsars. Such an injection is particularly pronounced in the magnetic field range 12 < logB < 12.6. (3) This is interpreted as due torecycled pulsars being released into the population. (4) We tentatively conclude that as much as 10 – 15% of all pulsars may have been born and processed in binary systems.

Spectral analysis of the residual pulsearrival times of pulsars is a useful tool in understanding the nature of the underlying processes that may be responsible for the timing noise observed from pulsars. Power spectra of pulsar timing residuals may be described by one or a combination of powerlaws. As these spectra are expected to be very steep, it is important to ensure a high dynamic range in the estimation of the spectrum. This is difficult in practice since one is, in general, dealing with timing measurements made at unevenly placed epochs. In this paper, we present a technique based on, ‘CLEAN’ to obtain high dynamic range spectra from unevenly sampled data. We compare the performance of this technique with other techniques including some that were used earlier for estimation of power spectra of pulsar timing residuals.

Power spectra of the timing noise observed in 18 southern pulsars have been derived using a novel technique, based on the CLEAN algorithm. Most of the spectra are well described by a single- or double-component power-law model. Some of these spectra can be interpreted in the context of one or more of the current timing noise models. The results combined with those obtained from the time-domain analyses of the timing activity in these pulsars are used to assess the viability of the various theoretical models of pulsar timing noise.

Most of the known pulsars are sources of highly linearly polarized radiation. Faraday rotation in the intervening medium rotates the plane of the linear polarization as the signals propagate through the medium. The Rotation Measure (RM), which quantifies the amount of such rotation as a function of wavelength, is useful in studying the properties of the medium and in recovering the intrinsic polarization characteristics of the pulsar signal. Conventional methods for polarization measurements use telescopes equipped with dual orthogonally polarized feeds that allow estimation of all 4 Stokes parameters. Some telescopes (such as the Ooty Radio Telescope) that offer high sensitivity for pulsar observations may however be receptive to only a single linear polarization. In such a case, the apparent spectral intensity modulation, resulting from differential Faraday rotation of the linearly polarized signal component within the observing bandwidth, can be exploited to estimate the RM as well as to study the linear polarization properties of the source. In this paper, we present two improved procedures by which these observables can be estimated reliably from the intensity modulation over large bandwidths, particularly at low radio frequencies. We also highlight some other applications where such measurements and procedures would be useful.

This paper describes the design, tests and preliminary results of a real-time parallel signal processor built to aid a wide variety of pulsar observations. The signal processor reduces the distortions caused by the effects of dispersion, Faraday rotation, doppler acceleration and parallactic angle variations, at a sustained data rate of 32 Msamples/sec. It also folds the pulses coherently over the period and integrates adjacent samples in time and frequency to enhance the signal-to-noise ratio. The resulting data are recorded for further off-line analysis of the characteristics of pulsars and the intervening medium. The signal processing for analysis of pulsar signals is quite complex, imposing the need for a high computational throughput, typically of the order of a Giga operations per second (GOPS). Conventionally, the high computational demand restricts the flexibility to handle only a few types of pulsar observations. This instrument is designed to handle a wide variety of Pulsar observations with the Giant Metre Wave Radio Telescope (GMRT), and is flexible enough to be used in many other high-speed, signal processing applications. The technology used includes field-programmable-gate-array(FPGA) based data/code routing interfaces, PC-AT based control, diagnostics and data acquisition, digital signal processor (DSP) chip based parallel processing nodes and C language based control software and DSP-assembly programs for signal processing. The architecture and the software implementation of the parallel processor are fine-tuned to realize about 60 MOPS per DSP node and a multiple-instruction-multiple-data (MIMD) capability.