English

Techniques for Measuring Parallax and Proper Motion with VLBI

Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics 2023-01-13 v1 Astrophysics of Galaxies

Abstract

Astrometry at centimeter wavelengths using Very Long Baseline Interferometry is approaching accuracies of ~1 uas for the angle between a target and a calibrator source separated by <1 degree on the sky. The BeSSeL Survey and the Japanese VERA project are using this to map the spiral structure of the Milky Way by measuring trigonometric parallaxes of hundreds of maser sources associated with massive, young stars. This paper outlines how micro-arcsecond astrometry is done, including details regarding the scheduling of observations, calibration of data, and measuring positions.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2301.04756,
  title  = {Techniques for Measuring Parallax and Proper Motion with VLBI},
  author = {Mark J. Reid},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2301.04756},
  year   = {2023}
}

Comments

18 pages; 5 figures

R2 v1 2026-06-28T08:09:48.273Z