HI Surveys with ALFA

As a member of the EGG group at Cornell I have been involved in various efforts to run precurser surveys to test the technology, data collection and data processing for HI drift surveys to be done with the new 21cm seven pixel feed array at Arecibo (the Arecibo L-band Feed Array or ALFA).

The surveys are now underway and preliminary results are coming out. I am involved in two of the surveys: ALFALFA (the Arecibo Legacy Fast ALFA survey), and the ZoA survey.

My biggest contribution so far has been my participation in precurser surveys to test techiniques with single pixel drift scans (observations done remotely and at Arecibo in the Autumn of 2003) before ALFA was put on the telescope. I am also interest in the local HI structure, and the impact that distance uncertainties will have on the surveys. The velocity field models from my thesis work should be a big help to nearby large area surveys in HI, where only a tiny fraction of the galaxies will have redshift independent distances.

ALFALFA

ALFALFA is the largest area extragalactic survey being done with ALFA. It aims to survey all high Galactic latitude sky visible from Arecibo in two drift passes resulting in a total integration time of 2x12 seconds.

Publications

The Arecibo Legacy Fast ALFA Survey:
1. Science Goals, Survey Design and Strategy Giovanelli, R., Haynes, M.P., Kent, B.R., Perillat, P., Saintonge, A., Brosch, N., Catinella, B., Hoffman, G.L., Stierwalt, S., Spekkens, K., Lerner, M., Masters, K.L., Momjian, E., Rosenberg, J., Springob, C.M. plus 25 others, 2005, Astron. J. (in press). astro-ph/0508301
2. Results of Precursor Observations Giovanelli, R., Haynes, M.P., Kent, B.R., Perillat, P., Catinella, B., Hoffman, G.L., Momjian, E., Rosenberg, J., Saintonge, A., Spekkens, K., Brosch, N., Masters, K.L., Springob, C.M., Karachentsev, I.D., Karachentseva, V.E., Koopmann, R.A., Muller, E., van Driel, W. & van Zee, L., 2005, Astron. J. (in press). astro-ph/0508300
Poster presentations at the AAS Altlanta (Jan 2004):
- Blind Extragalactic HI Surveys with the Arecibo and Green Bank Telescopes
  1. Simulations and Strategies for Survey Design, Giovanelli, R.; Haynes, M. P.; Spekkens, K.; Springob, C. M.; Masters, K. L.; Saintonge, A.; Catinella, B.; Kent, B.; Maddalena, R. J.; Magnani, L.; Koopmann, R. A. (ADS Abstract)
  2. Strategies for Map Construction and Signal Detection, Haynes, M. P.; Giovanelli, R.; Springob, C. M.; Saintonge, A.; Spekkens, K.; Masters, K. L.; Catinella, B.; Kent, B.; Maddalena, R. J.; Magnani, L.; Koopmann, R. A. (ADS Abstract)

The ZoA Survey

The ZoA survey wants to survey the low Galactic sky, looking for HI rich galaxies obscured from our view optically by dust in the plane of our Galaxy. The group is testing ways to observe simultaneously with other Galactic surveys (looking for pulsars, or studying gas in our Galaxy) to optimize the use of ALFA time.

The zone of avoidance covers a big chuck of the sky. Observing galaxies behind it is extremely important for the study of local large scale structure and flows.

General Links

E-ALFA Consortium Page: information on all the extragalactic surveys being done with ALFA.

Email: kmasters 'at' cfa.harvard.edu
Last modified: Thur Sept 1st 2005