J/ApJS/141/13 VLBA calibrator survey: VCS1 catalog (Beasley+, 2002)
The VLBA calibrator Survey - VCS1.
Beasley A.J., Gordon D., Peck A.B., Petrov L., MacMillan D.S.,
Fomalont E.B., Ma C.
<Astrophys. J. Suppl. Ser. 141, 13 (2002)>
=2002ApJS..141...13B 2002ApJS..141...13B
ADC_Keywords: Radio sources ; Surveys ; Positional data
Keywords: astrometry - radio continuum: general - reference systems -
surveys - techniques: interferometric
Abstract:
A catalog containing milli-arcsecond-accurate positions of 1332
extragalactic radio sources distributed over the northern sky is
presented - the Very Long Baseline Array Calibrator Survey (VCS1). The
positions have been derived from astrometric analysis of
dual-frequency 2.3 and 8.4 GHz VLBA snapshot observations; in a
majority of cases, images of the sources are also available. These
radio sources are suitable for use in geodetic and astrometric
experiments, and as phase-reference calibrators in high-sensitivity
astronomical imaging. The VCS1 is the largest high-resolution radio
survey ever undertaken and triples the number of sources available to
the radio astronomy community for VLBI applications. In addition to
the astrometric role, this survey can be used in active galactic
nuclei, Galactic, gravitational lens, and cosmological studies.
File Summary:
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FileName Lrecl Records Explanations
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ReadMe 80 . This file
table2.dat 99 1332 VCS1 Catalog
table4.dat 103 72 VCS1 ICRF-Ext.1 source catalog
table3.dat 10 126 *Sources not used in the astrometric solution
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Note on table3.dat: Sources not detected at either band, or yielding only one
measurement of group delay
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See also:
VIII/60 : Interferometer phase calibration sources (Patnaik+ 1998)
Byte-by-byte Description of file: table2.dat table4.dat
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Bytes Format Units Label Explanations
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1- 10 A10 --- VCS1 The VCS1 J2000.0 source name (JHHMM+DDMM)
12- 21 A10 --- IVS The IVS (International VLBI Service for Geodesy
and Astrometry) B1950 source name (HHMM+DDd)
22- 23 I2 h RAh Hour of Right ascension (J2000)
25- 26 I2 min RAm Minute of Right ascension (J2000)
28- 36 F9.6 s RAs Second of Right ascension (J2000)
38 A1 --- DE- Sign of the Declination (J2000)
39- 40 I2 deg DEd Degree of Declination (J2000)
42- 43 I2 arcmin DEm Arcminute of Declination (J2000)
45- 52 F8.5 arcsec DEs Arcsecond of Declination (J2000)
55- 63 F9.4 mas e_RAs Inflated formal error in Right ascension
65- 72 F8.4 mas e_DEs Inflated formal error in Declination
74- 79 F6.4 --- Corr Correlation between right ascension and
declination error estimates (1)
81- 87 I7 --- Num Number of observations used from survey sessions
89- 94 A6 --- BCode Band code (2)
96-108 A13 --- CName Catalogue name (vcs1 or ext1-est)
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Note (1): The greater the amplitude of the correlation, the higher the
eccentricity of the error ellipse for this source.
Note (2): Band code:
X/S = Solution incorporates both 2.3 & 8.4GHz group delays.
X-only = Solution incorporates only 8.4GHz group delays.
X+ = Solution incorporates only 8.4GHz group delays; 2.3GHz group
delays were available, but the number of 2.3GHz group delays
was significantly less than the number of 8.4GHz group delays.
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Byte-by-byte Description of file: table3.dat
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Bytes Format Units Label Explanations
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1- 10 A10 --- JVAS JVAS J2000 Source Name
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History:
* 09-Jul-2002: From electronic version of the journal
* 30-Jul-2003: J2126-0191 corrected in J2126-0119 in table2
2134+00 corrected in 2134+004 in table4
(End) Greg Schwarz [AAS], Patricia Bauer [CDS] 09-Jul-2002