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The ASKAP pilot survey program was designed to test strategies
that have been developed by ASKAP's science teams and
determine the telescope's readiness for full-scale surveys.
Each survey team has been allocated 100 hours of observing time to test its
own specific strategy.
The first EMU pilot survey field has already been imaged
and quality control checks are now underway by the EMU team.
The noise floor in the EMU pilot images is roughly 25
micro-janksy per beam. Some current issues with the reliability of beam weight
updates and correlator data streaming mean that typically
3 antennas and up to 20% of the bandwidth may be
flagged, so sensitivity limits should improve as these
issues are resolved.
Initial processing of EMU's pilot survey will provide Stokes
I and V multi-frequency synthesis images as well as a 1-MHz
Stokes I (total intensity) cube for comparison. To determine whether
POSSUM can operate commensally with EMU,
Stokes Q and U cubes will also be produced
once a viable method of leakage calibration has
been developed.
The image above is a small cut-out from the first of 10 fields in the EMU pilot survey.
More details are available from the latest
ASKAP Commissioning Update.
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