@article {2010A\&A...515A..53M, title = {{Coherence loss in phase-referenced VLBI observations}}, journal = {Astronomy and Astrophysics}, volume = {515}, year = {2010}, month = {jun}, pages = {A53}, abstract = {Context. Phase-referencing is a standard calibration technique in radio interferometry, particularly suited for the detection of weak sources close to the sensitivity limits of the interferometers. However, effects from a changing atmosphere and inaccuracies in the correlator model may affect the phase-referenced images, and lead to wrong estimates of source flux densities and positions. A systematic observational study of signal decoherence in phase-referencing and its effects in the image plane has not been performed yet.
Aims: We systematically studied how the signal coherence in Very-Long-Baseline-Interferometry (VLBI) observations is affected by a phase-reference calibration at different frequencies and for different calibrator-to-target separations. The results obtained should be of interest for a correct interpretation of many phase-referenced observations with VLBI.
Methods: We observed a set of 13 strong sources (the S5 polar cap sample) at 8.4 and 15 GHz in phase-reference mode with 32 different calibrator/target combinations spanning angular separations between 1.5 and 20.5 degrees. We obtained phase-referenced images and studied how the dynamic range and peak flux-density depend on observing frequency and source separation.
Results: We obtained dynamic ranges and peak flux densities of the phase-referenced images as a function of frequency and separation from the calibrator. We compared our results with models and phenomenological equations previously reported.
Conclusions: The dynamic range of the phase-referenced images is strongly limited by the atmosphere at all frequencies and for all source separations. The limiting dynamic range is inversely proportional to the sine of the calibrator-to-target separation. Not surpriseingly, we also find that the peak flux densities decrease with source separation, relative to those obtained from the self-calibrated images.}, keywords = {atmospheric effects, instrumentation: interferometers, techniques: interferometric}, doi = {10.1051/0004-6361/201014203}, url = {http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2010A\%26A...515A..53M}, author = {Mart{\'\i}-Vidal, I. and Ros, E. and M. A. P{\'e}rez-Torres and Guirado, J.~C. and Jim{\'e}nez-Monferrer, S. and Marcaide, J.~M.} }