Wideband RFI Monitor Requirements, Design, and Commissioning at DRAO

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Bruce, Nicholas, Baard, Charl, Harrison, Stephen, Islam, Mohammad, Otto, Abraham J., Lagoy, Dustin, Messing, Robert, Robert, Benoit, Robishaw, Timothy, Driessen, Peter F.
Format: Preprint
Published: 2026
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author Bruce, Nicholas
Baard, Charl
Harrison, Stephen
Islam, Mohammad
Otto, Abraham J.
Lagoy, Dustin
Messing, Robert
Robert, Benoit
Robishaw, Timothy
Driessen, Peter F.
author_facet Bruce, Nicholas
Baard, Charl
Harrison, Stephen
Islam, Mohammad
Otto, Abraham J.
Lagoy, Dustin
Messing, Robert
Robert, Benoit
Robishaw, Timothy
Driessen, Peter F.
contents In this paper, we introduce the radio frequency interference monitor deployed at the Dominion Radio Astrophysical Observatory. It provides 2 GHz of instantaneous bandwidth, supporting channel bandwidths as fine as ~100 Hz for 1 s integrations, or integration times as low as ~50 ms for the standard 3.33 kHz channel bandwidth. After operating as a prototype instrument for several years, the monitor was commissioned to improve the calibration method, analog section temperature, and gain stability. It now operates both as a transient detector and as a long-term radio environment characterization tool. We introduce novel applications for the monitor and derive a new method for calculating the effect of gain drift on integrated data.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2605_08479
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Wideband RFI Monitor Requirements, Design, and Commissioning at DRAO
Bruce, Nicholas
Baard, Charl
Harrison, Stephen
Islam, Mohammad
Otto, Abraham J.
Lagoy, Dustin
Messing, Robert
Robert, Benoit
Robishaw, Timothy
Driessen, Peter F.
Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics
In this paper, we introduce the radio frequency interference monitor deployed at the Dominion Radio Astrophysical Observatory. It provides 2 GHz of instantaneous bandwidth, supporting channel bandwidths as fine as ~100 Hz for 1 s integrations, or integration times as low as ~50 ms for the standard 3.33 kHz channel bandwidth. After operating as a prototype instrument for several years, the monitor was commissioned to improve the calibration method, analog section temperature, and gain stability. It now operates both as a transient detector and as a long-term radio environment characterization tool. We introduce novel applications for the monitor and derive a new method for calculating the effect of gain drift on integrated data.
title Wideband RFI Monitor Requirements, Design, and Commissioning at DRAO
topic Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2605.08479