WASP-3b: a strongly irradiated transiting gas-giant planet

We report the discovery of WASP-3b, the third transiting exoplanet to be discovered by the WASP and SOPHIE collaboration. WASP-3b transits its host star USNO-B1.0 1256−0285133 every  1.846 834 ± 0.000 002  d. Our high-precision radial velocity measurements present a variation with amplitude characteristic of a planetary-mass companion and in phase with the light curve. Adaptive optics imaging shows no evidence for nearby stellar companions, and line-bisector analysis excludes faint, unresolved binarity and stellar activity as the cause of the radial velocity variations. We make a preliminary spectroscopic analysis of the host star and find it to have   T _eff= 6400 ± 100 K  and  log   g = 4.25 ± 0.05  which suggests it is most likely an unevolved main-sequence star of spectral type F7-8V. Our simultaneous modelling of the transit photometry and reflex motion of the host leads us to derive a mass of  1.76^+0.08_−0.14 M _J  and radius  1.31^+0.07_−0.14 R _J  for WASP-3b. The proximity and relative temperature of the host star suggests that WASP-3b is one of the hottest exoplanets known, and thus has the potential to place stringent constraints on exoplanet atmospheric models.     

Testing isotropy of cosmic microwave background radiation

We introduce new symmetry-based methods to test for isotropy in cosmic microwave background (CMB) radiation. Each angular multipole is factored into unique products of power eigenvectors, related multipoles and singular values that provide two new rotationally invariant measures mode by mode. The power entropy and directional entropy are new tests of randomness that are independent of the usual CMB power. Simulated Galactic plane contamination is readily identified. The ILC– WMAP data maps show seven axes well aligned with one another and the direction Virgo. Parameter free statistics find 12 independent cases of extraordinary axial alignment, low power entropy, or both having 5 per cent probability or lower in an isotropic distribution. Isotropy of the ILC maps is ruled out to confidence levels of better than 99.9 per cent, whether or not coincidences with other puzzles coming from the Virgo axis are included. Our work shows that anisotropy is not confined to the low l region, but extends over a much larger l range.     

Exact reconstruction with directional wavelets on the sphere

A new formalism is derived for the analysis and exact reconstruction of band-limited signals on the sphere with directional wavelets. It represents an evolution of a previously developed wavelet formalism developed by Antoine & Vandergheynst and Wiaux et al. The translations of the wavelets at any point on the sphere and their proper rotations are still defined through the continuous three-dimensional rotations. The dilations of the wavelets are directly defined in harmonic space through a new kernel dilation, which is a modification of an existing harmonic dilation. A family of factorized steerable functions with compact harmonic support which are suitable for this kernel dilation are first identified. A scale-discretized wavelet formalism is then derived, relying on this dilation. The discrete nature of the analysis scales allows the exact reconstruction of band-limited signals. A corresponding exact multi-resolution algorithm is finally described and an implementation is tested. The formalism is of interest notably for the denoising or the deconvolution of signals on the sphere with a sparse expansion in wavelets. In astrophysics, it finds a particular application for the identification of localized directional features in the cosmic microwave background data, such as the imprint of topological defects, in particular, cosmic strings, and for their reconstruction after separation from the other signal components.     

zobov: a parameter-free void-finding algorithm

zobov (ZOnes Bordering On Voidness) is an algorithm that finds density depressions in a set of points, without any free parameters, or assumptions about shape. It uses the Voronoi tessellation to estimate densities, which it uses to find both voids and subvoids. It also measures probabilities that each void or subvoid arises from Poisson fluctuations. This paper describes the zobov algorithm, and the results from its application to the dark matter particles in a region of the Millennium simulation. Additionally, the paper points out an interesting high-density peak in the probability distribution of dark matter particle densities.     

Homogeneous and Heterogeneous Observational Data Weighting Method of Combined Orbit Determination of Near-earth Satellites of Bi-satellite Positioning System and its Applications

In the light of the problem of amalgamation and processing of multisource observational data in the combined orbit determination of near-earth satellites of the bi-satellite positioning system, the optimal weighting method of the improved variance component estimation of the two-step systematic error correction of homogeneous observational data is proposed. Analyses show that the multi-source amalgamation measurement model of the heterogeneous observational data essentially is a multi-structure, multi-parameter non-linear regression model, and the optimal weighting method of the combination of model structure characteristic analysis and variance component estimation of the heterogeneous observational data is established. The realization algorithms of the optimal weighting and the combined orbit determination parameter estimation of the two sorts of observational data are designed, and the simulation experiments of the combined orbit determination are carried out by taking the distances among the two satellites and the backup satellite and the homogeneous observational data and the distance between the two satellites and the heterogeneous observational data of satellite sensor angle measurements as the examples. The results of theoretical analysis and simulation calculation show that for the combined orbit determination of homogeneous observational data, the accuracy of orbit determination obtained by adopting the variance component estimation method of the two-step systematic error correction can be more superior than that obtained by means of the traditional empirical weighting method. For the combined orbit determination of heterogeneous observational data, through the introduction of the weighting factor by which the model structure is characterized the accuracies of the combined orbit determination of the near-earth satellite and geostationary satellite are both improved to a certain extent in comparison with the mean weighting mode.     

A new method for determining physical parameters of fundamental mode RR Lyrae stars from multicolour light curves

We present a new method for determining physical parameters of RRab variables exclusively from multicolour light curves. Our method is an inverse photometric Baade–Wesselink analysis which, using a non-linear least-squares algorithm, searches for the effective temperature ( T _eff) and pulsational velocity ( V _p) curves and other physical parameters that best fit the observed light curves, utilizing synthetic colours and bolometric corrections from static atmosphere models. The T _eff and V _p curves are initially derived from empirical relations then they are varied by the fitting algorithm. The method yields the variations and the absolute values of the radius, the effective temperature, the visual brightness and the luminosity of individual objects. Distance and mass are also determined. The method is tested on nine RRab stars subjected to Baade–Wesselink analyses earlier by several authors. The physical parameters derived by our method using only the light-curve data of these stars are well within their possible ranges defined by direct Baade–Wesselink and other techniques. A new empirical relation between the I _C magnitude and the pulsational velocity is also presented, which allows to construct the V _p curve of an RRab star purely from photometric observations to an accuracy of about 3.5 km s⁻¹.     

A novel multifrequency technique for the detection of point sources in cosmic microwave background maps

In this work we address the problem of simultaneous multifrequency detection of extragalactic point sources in the maps of the cosmic microwave background. We apply a new linear filtering technique, the 'matched matrix filters', that incorporates full spatial information, including the cross-correlation among channels, without making any a priori assumption about the spectral behaviour of the sources. A substantial reduction of the background is achieved thanks to the optimal combination of filtered maps. We describe the new technique in detail and apply it to the detection of radio sources and estimation of their parameters in realistic all-sky Planck simulations at 30, 44, 70 and 100 GHz. Then, we compare the results with the single-frequency approach based on the standard matched filter, in terms of reliability, completeness and flux accuracy of the resulting point source catalogues. The new filters outperform the standard matched filters for all these indexes at 30, 44 and 70 GHz, whereas at 100 GHz both kinds of filters have a similar performance. We find a notable increment of the number of true detections for a fixed reliability level. In particular, for a 95 per cent reliability we practically double the number of detections at 30, 44 and 70 GHz.     

Recovering the real-space correlation function from photometric redshift surveys

Measurements of clustering in large-scale imaging surveys that make use of photometric redshifts depend on the uncertainties in the redshift determination. We have used light-cone simulations to show how the deprojection method successfully recovers the real-space correlation function when applied to mock photometric redshift surveys. We study how the errors in the redshift determination affect the quality of the recovered two-point correlation function. Considering the expected errors associated with the planned photometric redshift surveys, we conclude that this method provides information on the clustering of matter useful for the estimation of cosmological parameters that depend on the large-scale distribution of galaxies.     

An interference removal technique for radio pulsar searches

Searches for radio pulsars are becoming increasingly difficult because of a rise in impulsive man-made terrestrial radio-frequency interference. Here, we present a new technique, zero dispersion measure filtering, which can significantly reduce the effects of such signals in pulsar search data. The technique has already been applied to a small portion of the data from the Parkes multi-beam pulsar survey, resulting in the discovery of four new pulsars, so illustrating its efficacy.