Precision solar astrometry from SoHO/MDI

High Precision Differential Astrometry

While conventional imaging in VLBI provides information only about the relative position between different features of a given source, phase-referenced observations can provide precise positional information with respect to an external reference. The use of differential techniques relies on the fact that most of the instrumental and propagation effects are common for radio sources sufficiently ...

Precision Geodesy and Astrometry Via

Precision Astrometry with Adaptive Optics

We investigate the limits of ground-based astrometry with adaptive optics using the core of the Galactic globular cluster M5. Adaptive optics systems provide near diffraction-limit imaging with the world’s largest telescopes. The substantial improvement in both resolution and signal-to-noise ratio enables high-precision astrometry from the ground. We describe the dominant systematic errors that...

High-precision Timing of Millisecond Pulsars and Precision Astrometry

We present the technique of long-term, high-precision timing of millisecond pulsars as applied to precision astrometry. We provide a tutorial on pulsars and pulsar timing, as well as up-to-date results of long-term timing observations of two millisecond pulsars, PSRs B1855+09 and B1937+21. We consider the feasibility of tying the extragalactic and optical reference frames to that deened by sola...

Some aspects of Relativistic Astrometry from within the Solar System

In this article we outline the structure of a general relativistic astrometric model which has been developed to deduce the position and proper motion of stars from 1-microarcsecond optical observations made by an astrometric satellite orbiting around the Sun. The basic assumption of our model is that the Solar System is the only source of gravity, hence we show how we modeled the satellite obs...