CHIME/FRB Outriggers: Design Overview
Abstract
The Canadian Hydrogen Intensity Mapping Experiment (CHIME) has emerged as the world's premier facility for studying fast radio bursts (FRBs) through its fast transient search backend CHIME/FRB\@. The CHIME/FRB Outriggers project will augment this high detection rate of 2--3 FRBs per day with the ability to precisely localize them using very long baseline interferometry (VLBI). Using three strategically located stations in North America and deploying recently developed synoptic VLBI observing techniques, the Outriggers will provide ~milliarcsecond localization precision for the majority of detected FRBs. This paper presents an overview of the design and implementation of the Outriggers, covering their geographic distribution, structural design, and observational capabilities. We detail the scientific objectives driving the project, including the characterization of FRB populations, host galaxy demographics, and the use of FRBs as cosmological probes. We also discuss the calibration strategies available to mitigate ionospheric and instrumental effects, ensuring high-precision localization. With two stations currently in science operations, and the third in commissioning, the CHIME/FRB Outriggers project is poised to become a cornerstone of the FRB field, offering unprecedented insights into this enigmatic cosmic phenomenon.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.2504.05192,
title = {CHIME/FRB Outriggers: Design Overview},
author = {FRB Collaboration and Mandana Amiri and Bridget C. Andersen and Shion Andrew and Kevin Bandura and Mohit Bhardwaj and Kalyani Bhopi and Vadym Bidula and P. J. Boyle and Charanjot Brar and Mark Carlson and Tomas Cassanelli and Alyssa Cassity and Shami Chatterjee and Jean-François Cliche and Alice P. Curtin and Rachel Darlinger and David R. DeBoer and Matt Dobbs and Fengqiu Adam Dong and Gwendolyn Eadie and Emmanuel Fonseca and B. M. Gaensler and Nina Gusinskaia and Mark Halpern and Ian Hendricksen and Jason Hessels and Ronniy C. Joseph and Jane Kaczmarek and Victoria M. Kaspi and Kholoud Khairy and T. L. Landecker and Adam E. Lanman and Albert Wai Kit Lau and Mattias Lazda and Calvin Leung and Robert A. Main and Kiyoshi W. Masui and Ryan Mckinven and Juan Mena-Parra and Bradley W. Meyers and Daniele Michilli and Nikola Milutinovic and Kenzie Nimmo and Gavin Noble and Ayush Pandhi and Aaron B. Pearlman and Jeffrey B. Peterson and Emily Petroff and Ziggy Pleunis and Alexander W. Pollak and Masoud Rafiei-Ravandi and Andre Renard and Mawson W. Sammons and Ketan R. Sand and Pranav Sanghavi and Paul Scholz and Vishwangi Shah and Kaitlyn Shin and Seth R. Siegel and Andrew Siemion and Jonathan L. Sievers and Kendrick Smith and David Spear and Ingrid Stairs and Keith Vanderlinde and Haochen Wang and Jacob P. Willis and Tarik J. Zegmott},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2504.05192},
year = {2025}
}
Comments
32 pages, 7 figures, submitted to ApJ