• Journal of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.42 no.1
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• pp.1-7
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• 2009

The e-CALLISTO is a global network of frequency-agile solar radio spectrometers that was constructed in a collaboration between Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich (ETH Zurich) and local host institutes. It is intended to monitor solar radio bursts 24 hours a day in frequency range between 45 MHz and 870 MHz. One of e-CALLISTO spectrometer was installed at Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute (KASI) in 2007 October. The spectrometer gets signals from a horizontally polarized log-periodic antenna mounted on an automatic Sun-tracking system. Tracking status and data are monitored in Space Weather Monitoring Laboratory (SWML) of KASI in real time, and flare time data are transferred to ETH Zurich data archive daily. Using this spectrometer we obtained a couple of type II solar radio bursts on 2007 December 31, and found that these bursts are associated with a CME which occurred on the east limb.

• Journal of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.48 no.3
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• pp.177-185
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• 2015

We develop a new auto-guiding system for the Camera for QUasars in the EArly uNiverse (CQUEAN). CQUEAN is an optical CCD camera system attached to the 2.1-m Otto-Struve Telescope (OST) at McDonald Observatory, USA. The new auto-guiding system differs from the original one in the following: instead of the cassegrain focus of the OST, it is attached to the finder scope; it has its own filter system for observation of bright targets; and it is controlled with the CQUEAN Auto-guiding Package, a newly developed auto-guiding program. Finder scope commands a very wide field of view at the expense of poorer light gathering power than that of the OST. Based on the star count data and the limiting magnitude of the system, we estimate there are more than 5.9 observable stars with a single FOV using the new auto-guiding CCD camera. An adapter is made to attach the system to the finder scope. The new auto-guiding system successfully guided the OST to obtain science data with CQUEAN during the test run in 2014 February. The FWHM and ellipticity distributions of stellar profiles on CQUEAN, images guided with the new auto-guiding system, indicate similar guiding capabilities with the original auto-guiding system but with slightly poorer guiding performance at longer exposures, as indicated by the position angle distribution. We conclude that the new auto-guiding system has overall similar guiding performance to the original system. The new auto-guiding system will be used for the second generation CQUEAN, but it can be used for other cassegrain instruments of the OST.

• Journal of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.46 no.6
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• pp.225-234
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• 2013

We develop a radio receiver system operating at ${\lambda}{\sim}1.3$ mm for the 6 m telescope of Seoul Radio Astronomy Observatory. It consists of a dual polarization receiver, a couple of IF processing units, two FFT spectrometers, and associated software. By adopting sideband-separating superconductor mixers with image band terminated to waveguide load at 4.2 K, we achieve $T_{RX}{\leq}100$ K and $T_{sys}$ less than 150 K at best weather condition over 210-250 GHz frequency range. The intermediate frequency signal of 3.5-4.5 GHz is down converted to 0-1 GHz and fed into the FFT spectrometers. The spectrometer covers 1 GHz bandwidth with a spectral resolution of 61 KHz. Test observations are conducted toward several radio sources to evaluate the performance of the system. Aperture and beam efficiencies measured by observing planets are found to be typically 44 ~ 59% and 47 ~ 61%, respectively over the RF band, which are consistent with those measured at 3 mm band previously.

• Journal of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.51 no.3
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• pp.65-71
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• 2018

The near real-time speckle masking reconstruction technique has been developed to accelerate the processing of solar images to achieve high resolutions for ground-based solar telescopes. However, the reconstruction of solar subimages in such a speckle reconstruction is very time-consuming. We design and implement a new parallel speckle masking reconstruction algorithm based on the Compute Unified Device Architecture (CUDA) on General Purpose Graphics Processing Units (GPGPU). Tests are performed to validate the correctness of our program on NVIDIA GPGPU. Details of several parallel reconstruction steps are presented, and the parallel implementation between various modules shows a significant speed increase compared to the previous serial implementations. In addition, we present a comparison of runtimes across serial programs, the OpenMP-based method, and the new parallel method. The new parallel method shows a clear advantage for large scale data processing, and a speedup of around 9 to 10 is achieved in reconstructing one solar subimage of $256{\times}256pixels$. The speedup performance of the new parallel method exceeds that of OpenMP-based method overall. We conclude that the new parallel method would be of value, and contribute to real-time reconstruction of an entire solar image.

• Journal of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.38 no.4
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• pp.437-443
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• 2005

The Solar Radio Burst Locator (SRBL) is a spectrometer that can observe solar microwave bursts over a wide band (0.1-18 GHz) as well as detect the burst locations without interferometry or mechanical scanning. Its prototype has been operated at Owens Valley Radio Observatory (OVRO) since 1998. In this study, we have evaluated the capability of the SRBL system in flux and radio burst location measurements. For this, we consider 130 microwave bursts from 2000 to 2002. The SRBL radio fluxes of 53 events were compared with the fluxes from USAF/RSTN and the burst locations of 25 events were compared with the optical flare locations. From this study, we found: (1) there is a relatively good correlation (r = 0.9) between SRBL flux and RSTN flux; (2) the mean location error is about 8.4 arcmin and the location error (4.7 arcmin) of single source events is much smaller than that (14.9 arcmin) of multiple source events; (3) the minimum location error usually occurred just after the starting time of burst, mostly within 10 seconds; (4) there is a possible anti-correlation (r = -0.4) between the pointing error of SRBL antenna and the location error. The anti-correlation becomes more evident (r=-0.9) for 6 strong single source events associated with X-class flares. Our results show that the flux measurement of SRBL is consistent with that of RSTN, and the mean location error of SRBL is estimated to be about 5 arcmin for single source events.

• Journal of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.48 no.5
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• pp.229-236
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• 2015

We report results of investigation of amplitude calibration for very long baseline interferometry (VLBI) observations with Korean VLBI Network (KVN). Amplitude correction factors are estimated based on comparison of KVN observations at 22 GHz correlated by Daejeon hardware correlator and DiFX software correlator in Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute (KASI) with Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA) observations at 22 GHz by DiFX software correlator in National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO). We used the observations for compact radio sources, 3C 454.3, NRAO 512, OJ 287, BL Lac, 3C 279, 1633+382, and 1510–089, which are almost unresolved for baselines in a range of 350-477 km. Visibility data of the sources obtained with similar baselines at KVN and VLBA are selected, fringe-fitted, calibrated, and compared for their amplitudes. We find that visibility amplitudes of KVN observations should be corrected by factors of 1.10 and 1.35 when correlated by DiFX and Daejeon correlators, respectively. These correction factors are attributed to the combination of two steps of 2-bit quantization in KVN observing systems and characteristics of Daejeon correlator.

• Journal of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.51 no.2
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• pp.27-36
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• 2018

In a solar coronagraph, the most important component is an occulter to block the direct light from the disk of the sun. Because the intensity of the solar outer corona is $10^{-6}$ to $10^{-10}$ times of that of the solar disk ($I_{\odot}$), it is necessary to minimize scattering at the optical elements and diffraction at the occulter. Using a Fourier optic simulation and a stray light test, we investigated the performance of a compact coronagraph that uses an external truncated-cone occulter without an internal occulter and Lyot stop. In the simulation, the diffracted light was minimized to the order of $7.6{\times}10^{-10}I_{\odot}$ when the cone angle ${\theta}_c$ was about $0.39^{\circ}$. The performance of the cone occulter was then tested by experiment. The level of the diffracted light reached the order of $6{\times}10^{-9}I_{\odot}$ at ${\theta}_c=0.40^{\circ}$. This is sufficient to observe the outer corona without additional optical elements such as a Lyot stop or inner occulter. We also found the manufacturing tolerance of the cone angle to be $0.05^{\circ}$, the lateral alignment tolerance was $45{\mu}m$, and the angular alignment tolerance was $0.043^{\circ}$. Our results suggest that the physical size of coronagraphs can be shortened significantly by using a cone occulter.

• Journal of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.52 no.6
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• pp.227-233
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• 2019

We report the performance of the 13.7-meter Taeduk Radio Astronomy Observatory (TRAO) radio telescope. The telescope has been equipped with a new receiver, SEQUOIA-TRAO, a new backend system, FFT2G, and a new VxWorks operating system. The receiver system features a 16-pixel focal plane array using high-performance MMIC preamplifiers; it shows very low system noise levels, with system noise temperatures from 150 K to 450 K at frequencies from 86 to 115 GHz. With the new backend system, we can simultaneously obtain 32 spectra, each with a velocity coverage of 163 km s^-1 and a resolution of 0.04 km s^-1 at 115 GHz. The new operating system, VxWorks, has successfully handled the LMTMC-TRAO observing software. The main observing method is the on-the-fly (OTF) mapping mode; a position-switching mode is available for small-area observations. Remote observing is provided. The antenna surface has been newly adjusted using digital photogrammetry, achieving a rms surface accuracy better than 130 ㎛. The pointing uncertainty is found to be less than 5" over the entire sky. We tested the new receiver system with multi-frequency observations in OTF mode. The aperture efficiencies are 43±1%, 42±1%, 37±1%, and 33±1%, the beam efficiencies are 45±2%, 48±2%, 46±2%, and 41±2% at 86, 98, 110, and 115 GHz, respectively.

• Publications of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.27 no.5
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• pp.391-397
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• 2012

The SPICA (SPace Infrared Telescope for Cosmology & Astrophysics) project is a next-generation infrared space telescope optimized for mid- and far-infrared observation with a cryogenically cooled 3m-class telescope. It will achieve the high resolution as well as the unprecedented sensitivity from mid to far-infrared range. The FPC (Focal Plane Camera) proposed by KASI as an international collaboration is a near-infrared instrument. The FPC-S and FPC-G are responsible for the scientific observation in the near-infrared and the fine guiding, respectively. The FPC-G will significantly reduce pointing error down to below 0.075 arcsec through the observation of guiding stars in the focal plane. We analyzed the pointing requirement from the focal plane instruments as well as the error factors affecting the pointing stability. We also obtained the expected performance in operation modes. We concluded that the FPC-G can achieve the pointing stability below 0.075 arcsec which is the requirement from the focal plane instruments.

• Publications of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.35-41
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• 2016

We have constructed a wide-field photometric survey system called as the Korea Microlensing Telescope Network (KMTNet) in 2015. It consists of three 1.6 m optical telescopes equipped with mosaic CCD cameras. Four 9k CCDs were installed on the focal plane of each telescope. In this paper, we present the crosstalk analysis of the KMTNet mosaic CCD images. The crosstalk victims caused by bright sources were visible at eight sub-images obtained through different readout ports of each CCD. The crosstalk coefficients were estimated to be several tens of $10^{-4}$ in maximum, differing from sub-image to sub-image, and the non-linearity effect certainly appeared at the victims made from saturated sources. We developed software functions to correct the crosstalk effect of the KMTNet CCD images. The software functions showed satisfying results to remove clearly most of the crosstalk victims and have been implemented in the KMTNet image processing pipeline since 2015 September.