The control system of the active main reflector for FAST

The main reflector of FAST consists of about 1800 elementary units. Each unit has three adjustable supports to fix its position, and its position is adjusted by mean of mechanical actuators. According to the radio source position at any given time, all the actuators are continuously adjusted to form a proper paraboloid in real time during the course of the observation. The basic requirements of such a control system are discussed. A field bus control system based on LonWorks technology is suggested to control all 1800actuators. The main advantages of this distributed control system are its reliability, flexibility, efficiency and economics. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Differential correction method applied to measurement of the FAST reflector

The Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical radio Telescope(FAST) adopts an active deformable main reflector which is composed of 4450 triangular panels. During an observation, the illuminated area of the reflector is deformed into a 300-m diameter paraboloid and directed toward a source. To achieve accurate control of the reflector shape, positions of 2226 nodes distributed around the entire reflector must be measured with sufficient precision within a limited time, which is a challenging task because of the large scale. Measurement of the FAST reflector makes use of stations and node targets. However, in this case the effect of the atmosphere on measurement accuracy is a significant issue. This paper investigates a differential correction method for total stations measurement of the FAST reflector. A multi-benchmark differential correction method, including a scheme for benchmark selection and weight assignment, is proposed. Onsite evaluation experiments show there is an improvement of 70%–80% in measurement accuracy compared with the uncorrected measurement, verifying the effectiveness of the proposed method.     

EMC design for actuators in the FAST reflector

An active reflector is one of the three main innovations incorporated in the Five-hundredmeter Aperture Spherical radio Telescope(FAST).The deformation of such a huge spherically shaped reflector into different transient parabolic shapes is achieved by using 2225 hydraulic actuators which change the position of the 2225 nodes through the connected down tied cables.For each different tracking process of the telescope,more than 1/3 of these 2225 actuators must be in operation to tune the parabolic aperture accurately and meet the surface error restriction.This means that some of these actuators are inevitably located within the main beam of the receiver,and Electromagnetic Interference(EMI)from the actuators must be mitigated to ensure the scientific output of the telescope.Based on the threshold level of interference detrimental to radio astronomy described in ITU-R Recommendation RA.769 and EMI measurements,the shielding efficiency(SE)requirement for each actuator is set to be 80 d B in the frequency range from 70 MHz to 3 GHz.Therefore,Electromagnetic Compatibility(EMC)was taken into account in the actuator design by measures such as power line filters,optical fibers,shielding enclosures and other structural measures.In 2015,all the actuators had been installed at the FAST site.Till now,no apparent EMI from the actuators has been detected by the receiver,which demonstrates the effectiveness of these EMC measures.     

Unit panel node detection by CNN on FAST reflector

The Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical radio Telescope(FAST) has an active reflector.During observations, the reflector will be deformed into a paraboloid 300 meters in diameter. To improve its surface accuracy, we propose a scheme for photogrammetry to measure the positions of 2226 nodes on the reflector. The way to detect the nodes in the photos is the key problem in this application of photogrammetry. This paper applies a convolutional neural network(CNN) with candidate regions to detect the nodes in the photos. Experimental results show a high recognition rate of 91.5%, which is much higher than the recognition rate for traditional edge detection.     

Recognition of FAST reflector nodes based on Canny operator

The reflector system of Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical radio Telescope(FAST) is designed as 4450 rigid panels supported by a flexible cable-net structure. We use 10 total stations to measure2225 nodes of the cable-net and then control the shape of the reflectors. Every time, it takes at least 35 minutes to finish the calibration of the whole cable-net once. It is indeed far too inefficient. Thus, we developed a set of highly efficient instrument CRRS(CCD Rotation Ranging System). It is based on photogrammetry and can finish the measurement in 1 minute. However, the target we used in CRRS is active target, and it has serious electromagnetic interference problems to affect the use of FAST. Take the above reasons into consideration, we plan to identify the nodes by taking the gap between the reflector panels as the feature condition. The new method can take the place of active targets to finish the measuring task. The present work focuses on the following aspects. First, combined with the characteristics of FAST reflector images,the representative algorithms of image edge detection are discussed. Second, the process of node extraction is introduced in detail so that we know that it works. In addition, experimental results are given to draw a conclusion so that Canny algorithm was used for continuous research of reflector edge detection.     

Research on key technologies for installation and maintenance of reflector of FAST

The reflector of the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical radio Telescope(FAST)consists of 4450 reflector units.Installation of the reflector faces the challenges of large span,complex terrain,serious interference,complex processes,high position and inability to use conventional equipment.The installation technology for the flexible reflector with a large span was specially studied and designed.Two half-span arc-moving cable cranes and two transfer trucks were jointly operated along a path that follows a circular beam.After installation of the reflector was completed,two half-span cable cranes were merged into a set of full-span cable cranes for maintenance of the reflector.Installation of the reflector combines features of unit and site topography of FAST.The installation technology follows scientific and reasonable practices,and is highly efficient and convenient.It represents a breakthrough in many key technologies in construction and maintenance techniques.It has promoted related technical progress in the construction and maintenance of complex projects.It has also provided an important reference for the construction and maintenance of similar projects,and has strong significance and applicability.     

An open-loop control algorithm of the active reflector system of FAST

An open-loop control algorithm is put forward for continuous paraboloid deformation of the active reflector system of the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical radio Telescope(FAST).The method is based on a calibration database and interpolation in 2D spatial domain and temperature domain,respectively.It is completely independent of real-time measurement of cable nodes so that it has advantage of working all-weather and no additional electro-magnetic interference(EMI).Furthermore,its control accuracy can be effectively improved via reasonable layout of the calibrated paraboloids and increasing calibration accuracy.Meanwhile deformation safety is considered via calibration as well.Finally its control accuracy is also confirmed via site measurements of paraboloid deformations.     

Deformation measurement by single spherical near-field intensity measurement for large reflector antenna

This paper presents a new method to obtain the deformation distribution on the main reflector of an antenna only by measuring the electric intensity on a spheri...     

A novel design for a giant Arecibo-type spherical radio telescope with an active main reflector

A novel design for a giant spherical radio telescope is proposed. Instead of a fixed spherical reflecting surface such as with the 305-m Arecibo telescope, the illuminated portion of the reflecting surface is made to fit a paraboloid of revolution in real time by active control. A simple feed can thus be used, enabling the realization of broad bandwidth and full polarization. The actual design utilizes a karst depression which gives a spherical surface of 300-m radius, having an opening of 500-m diameter. The illuminated aperture is chosen to be 300 m, and the focal ratio is 0.46–0.48. With this geometry and the simple feeding system, a giant telescope with large sky coverage can be achieved at low cost. When the illuminated aperture is limited to 70–100 m, the area trackable can be extended to about 10° above the horizon.     

Research on the panel adjustment method of an active main reflector for a large radio telescope

The surface accuracy of a large parabolic antenna is an important indicator to evaluate the quality of the antenna.It not only directly affects the antenna’s aperture efficiency,thereby determining the shortest wavelength that the antenna can work,but also affects the main lobe width and side lobe structure of the antenna pattern.Microwave holography is an important method for parabolic antenna profile detection.In this article we adopt a new algorithm to adjust the panels for the large radio telescope with an active main reflector through the TM65 m antenna’s aperture phase profile.The panels of the TM65 m radio telescope is in a radial pattern with 14 rings.Each corner of the panel is fixed on the screw of the actuator to move up and down,and the adjacent corners of the four panels share an actuator.We use the method of plane fitting to calculate the adjustment value of every panel’s corner.But one actuator,which simultaneously controls the common corner of the adjacent panels,will have different adjustment values according to the different plane fitting equation based on adjacent panels.In this paper,the adjustment value of the adjacent panels’crosspoints are constrained to be equal to the constraint condition to calculate each actuator’s adjustment value of the TM65 m radio telescope.Through multiple adjustments and application of the new algorithms,the accuracy of the TM65 m antenna reflector profile has been improved from the original 0.28 mm to the current 0.19 mm.     

Non-uniform temperature distribution of the main reflector of a large radio telescope under solar radiation

The non-uniform temperature distribution of the main reflector of a large radio telescope may cause serious deformation of the main reflector,which will dramati...     

大射电望远镜FAST风环境数值模拟研究

500 m口径球面射电望远镜(Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical radio Telescope,FAST),整体结构处于复杂的喀斯特地貌上,反射面承受风载荷作用,需要进行抗风设计。建立了FAST反射面及其周边山地地形的计算流体动力学(Computational Fluid Dynamics,CFD)计算模型,计算域范围为40 km×10 km×5.5 km。确定了入口风速剖面的基准高度为海拔810 m。计算了不同风向下反射面风压系数分布特征,得出了不利风向。对挡风墙的研究结果表明,挡风墙高度选择的效果优于位置选择。该研究结果可为FAST工程提供抗风设计的初步参考。     

A motion planning algorithm for the feed support system of FAST

The paper relates to a motion planning algorithm for the feed support system of the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical radio Telescope(FAST).To enhance the stability of the feed support system,the start/termination planning segments are adopted with an acceleration and deceleration section.The source switching planning adopts a combination of a line segment and focal segment to realize stable control of the feed support system.Besides,during the observation trajectory,a transition segment which is not used for observation data is planned with a required time.Through an example simulation,a smooth change is realized via the motion planning algorithm and presented in this paper.     

A preliminary study of the Extreme Ultraviolet spectroheliograms from Skylab

Some of the first observations obtained with the Naval Research Laboratory's Extreme Ultraviolet Spectrograph (S082A) during the first Skylab mission are presented and compared with magnetograms and other ground-based data. The instrument is a slitless objective-type grating spectrograph covering 170–630 Å and described in Solar Phys. 27, 251 (1972). Chromospheric network, loop prominences, active regions, a flare, limb brightening, XUV bright points, and coronal holes are among the phenomena shown and discussed.     

A preliminary measurement of the doppler and compton effect in the blue spectrum of 13 monocerontis

A preliminary radial velocity of 13 Mon and the redshift caused by the scattering of photons in its chromosphere are given. They have been obtained from the wavelengths of 39 spectral lines, measured in 2 spectra and the corresponding halfwidth measured in 4 spectra, taken in 1980 with a dispersion of about 9 Å/mm. (1 Å = 0.1 nm), in the range 3700 Å-5000 Å.     

FAST L波段多波束馈源设计的初步分析

把抛物面天线的偏焦理论应用于FAST L波段多波束馈源系统的设计,分析了馈源喇叭横向偏焦距离与相应波束偏离角之间的关系,结合多波束射电望远镜扫描方式的要求,给出了FAST L波段多波束馈源的工作带宽、多波束馈源中相邻喇叭的间距以及喇叭口径大小的限制,并对正六边形阵列中处于不同位置的喇叭对应的波束的主瓣情况作了详细计算和分析。由此说明了FAST L波段多波束馈源采用19波束的可行性。另一方面,根据得到的工作频率带宽和喇叭口径大小的情况,对OMT和喇叭类型的选择进行了探讨。本文给出了FAST L波段多波束系统的大概轮廓,为进一步精确设计指明了方向。     

FASTL波段多波束馈源设计的初步分析

把抛物面天线的偏焦理论应用于FASTL波段多波束馈源系统的设计,分析了馈源喇叭横向偏焦距离与相应波束偏离角之间的关系,结合多波束射电望远镜扫描方式的要求,给出了FASTL波段多波束馈源的工作带宽、多波束馈源中相邻喇叭的间距以及喇叭口径大小的限制,并对正六边形阵列中处于不同位置的喇叭对应的波束的主瓣情况作了详细计算和分析。由此说明了FASTL波段多波束馈源采用19波束的可行性。另一方面,根据得到的工作频率带宽和喇叭口径大小的情况,对OMT和喇叭类型的选择进行了探讨。本文给出了FASTL波段多波束系统的大概轮廓,为进一步精确设计指明了方向。     

Search for possible exomoons with the FAST telescope

Our knowledge of the solar system encourages us to believe that we might expect exomoons to be present around some known exoplanets. With present hardware and existing optical astronomy methods, we do not expect to be able to find exomoons for at least 10 years, and even then, it will be a hard task to detect them. Using data from the Exoplanet Orbit Database(EOD) we find stars with Jovian exoplanets within 50 light years. Most of them will be fully accessible by the new radio telescope, the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical radio Telescope(FAST), under construction which is now in the test phase. We suggest radio astronomy based methods to search for possible exomoons around two exoplanets.     

Schemes for Segmenting the Main Reflector of the FAST

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