Type II solar bursts characteristically drift slowly from high to low frequencies at a rate of about 0.1 MHz/s, appear only at frequencies lower than 250 MHz, and frequently have harmonic structure, i.e. there are identifiable spectral features within the fundamental which are duplicated at twice the frequency. Thus it is clear that at least in some cases, true harmonic radiation is involved; the source region emits frequencies f and 2f simultaneously.

The reasons for re-surveying the neutral hydrogen in the Small Magellanic Cloud and the results from that survey are briefly discussed in our previous paper (McGee and Newton 1982 — Paper I). We now present the experimental details, the 489 observed line profiles and details of the Gaussian analysis of each one. The profiles here are from the ‘main body’ of the SMC. Those of the ‘bridge region’ between the two Clouds of Magellan will form the basis of a later paper.

The study of both neutral and ionised gas in young radio sources is providing key information on the effect the radio plasma has on the ISM of these objects. We present results obtained for the compact radio sources PKS 1549–79, 4C 12.50 and PKS 1814–63 and for the intermediate-size radio galaxy 3C 459. At least in the first two, low ionisation optical emission lines and HI absorption appear to be associated with the extended, but relatively quiescent, dusty cocoon surrounding the nucleus. The [OIII] lines are, on the other hand, mostly associated with the region of interaction between the radio plasma and the ISM, indicating a fast outflow from the centre. A case of fast outflow (up to ∼1000 km s-1) is also observed in HI in the radio source 4C 12.50. As the radio source evolves, any obscuring material along the radio axis is swept aside until, eventually, cavities (of the same kind as observed e.g. in Cygnus A) are hollowed out on either side of the nucleus. We may witness this phase in the evolution of a radio source in the radio galaxy 3C 459.

We present the pulsar_spectra software repository, an open-source pulsar flux density catalogue and automated spectral fitting software that finds the best spectral model and produces publication-quality plots. The python-based software includes features that enable users in the astronomical community to add newly published spectral measurements to the catalogue as they become available. The spectral fitting software is an implementation of the method described in Jankowski et al. (2018, MNRAS, 473, 4436) which uses robust statistical methods to decide on the best-fitting model for individual pulsar spectra. pulsar_spectra is motivated by the need for a centralised repository for pulsar flux density measurements to make published measurements more accessible to the astronomical community and provide a suite of tools for measuring spectra.

The parameters of a new Australia Telescope Compact Array (ATCA) mosaic of the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) in the 21-cm line of neutral hydrogen are described. A preliminary peak-brightness-temperature image of the whole of the LMC, and a detailed image of the region around the supergiant shells LMC 4 and 5 is shown.

The standard formula for the resolving power R(= λ/Δλ) of an astronomical grating spectrograph is Here L is the linear size of the grating, perpendicular to the direction of the grooves, θB is the blaze angle of the grating, θS is the angular size of the slit, projected back on to the sky, and D is the diameter of the telescope objective. The formula is valid for gratings used in the Littrow condition, when the angle of incidence α, and the angle of diffraction β, are both close to θB.

We present SimSpin, a new, public, software framework for generating integral field spectroscopy (IFS) data cubes from N-body/hydrodynamical simulations of galaxies, which can be compared directly with observational datasets. SimSpin provides a consistent method for studying a galaxy’s stellar component. It can be used to explore how observationally inferred measurements of kinematics, such as the spin parameter $\lambda_R$ , are impacted by the effects of, for example, inclination, seeing conditions, distance. SimSpin is written in R and has been designed to be highly modular, flexible, and extensible. It is already being used by the astrophysics community to generate IFS-like cubes and FITS files for direct comparison of simulations to observations. In this paper, we explain the conceptual framework of SimSpin; how it is implemented in R; and we demonstrate SimSpin’s current capabilities, providing as an example a brief investigation of how numerical resolution affects how reliably we can recover the intrinsic stellar kinematics of a simulated galaxy.

Most applications of Bayesian Inference for parameter estimation and model selection in astrophysics involve the use of Monte Carlo techniques such as Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) and nested sampling. However, these techniques are time-consuming and their convergence to the posterior could be difficult to determine. In this study, we advocate variational inference as an alternative to solve the above problems, and demonstrate its usefulness for parameter estimation and model selection in astrophysics. Variational inference converts the inference problem into an optimisation problem by approximating the posterior from a known family of distributions and using Kullback–Leibler divergence to characterise the difference. It takes advantage of fast optimisation techniques, which make it ideal to deal with large datasets and makes it trivial to parallelise on a multicore platform. We also derive a new approximate evidence estimation based on variational posterior, and importance sampling technique called posterior-weighted importance sampling for the calculation of evidence, which is useful to perform Bayesian model selection. As a proof of principle, we apply variational inference to five different problems in astrophysics, where Monte Carlo techniques were previously used. These include assessment of significance of annual modulation in the COSINE-100 dark matter experiment, measuring exoplanet orbital parameters from radial velocity data, tests of periodicities in measurements of Newton’s constant G, assessing the significance of a turnover in the spectral lag data of GRB 160625B, and estimating the mass of a galaxy cluster using weak gravitational lensing. We find that variational inference is much faster than MCMC and nested sampling techniques for most of these problems while providing competitive results. All our analysis codes have been made publicly available.

The existence of a stream of tidally stripped stars from the Sagittarius dwarf galaxy demonstrates that the Milky Way is still in the process of accreting mass. More recently, an extensive stream of stars has been uncovered in the halo of the Andromeda galaxy (M31), revealing that it too is cannibalising a small companion. This paper reports the recent observations of this stream, determining its spatial and kinematic properties, and tracing its three-dimensional structure, as well as describing future observations and what we may learn about the Andromeda galaxy from this giant tidal stream.

A simple model for solar flares is described which invokes many ion-acoustic double layers in the source region. The ability of the model to explain some of the observed characteristics of solar flares is discussed, particular attention being paid to the well-observed high-energy flare examined by de Jager et al. (1987).

Space interferometry is the inevitable end point of high angular resolution astrophysics, and a key technology that can be leveraged to analyse exoplanet formation and atmospheres with exceptional detail. However, the anticipated cost of large missions, such as Darwin and TPF-I, and inadequate technology readiness levels have resulted in limited developments since the late 2000s. Here, we present a feasibility study into a small-scale formation-flying interferometric array in low Earth orbit, which will aim to prove the technical concepts involved with space interferometry while still making unique astrophysical measurements. We will detail the proposed system architecture and metrology system, as well as present orbital simulations that show that the array should be stable enough to perform interferometry with <50 m s–1 yr–1 delta-v and one thruster per spacecraft. We also conduct observability simulations to identify which parts of the sky are visible for a given orbital configuration. We conclude with optimism that this design is achievable, but a more detailed control simulation factoring in a demonstrated metrology system is the next step to demonstrate full mission feasibility.

On 1975 August 22 an outburst above the west limb of the Sun was observed with the Culgoora radioheliograph at 43, 80 and 160 MHz. The first stages of the event included intense type III/V bursts followed by a type II burst with multiple, fundamental and harmonic bands and herringbone structure. While the type II burst was still in progress a moving type IV burst appeared. It was eventually observed out to a distance of more than 3 R⊙. This was the first moving type IV burst observed with the two-dimensional radioheliograph operating at three frequencies; as such it provides valuable constraints on models of moving type IV sources.

The Magellanic System represents one of the best places to study the formation and evolution of galaxies. Photometric surveys of various depths, areas and wavelengths have had a significant impact on our understanding of the system; however, a complete picture is still lacking. VMC (the VISTA near-infrared YJKs survey of the Magellanic System) will provide new data to derive the spatially resolved star formation history and to construct a three-dimensional map of the system. These data combined with those from other ongoing and planned surveys will give us an absolutely unique view of the system opening up the doors to truly new science!

While galaxies with clockwise and counterclockwise handedness are visually different, they are expected to be symmetric in all of their other characteristics. Previous experiments using both manual analysis and machine vision have shown that the handedness of Sloan Digital Sky Survey galaxies can be predicted with accuracy significantly higher than mere chance using its photometric data alone. However, some of these previous experiments were based on manually classified galaxies, and the results may therefore be subjected to bias originated from the human perception. This paper describes an experiment based on a set of 162,514 galaxies classified automatically to clockwise and counterclockwise spiral galaxies, showing that the source of the asymmetry in Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) database is not the human perception bias. The results are compared to two smaller datasets, and confirm the observation that the handedness of SDSS galaxies can be predicted by their photometry. The experiment also shows statistically significant differences in the measured magnitude of SDSS galaxies, according which galaxies with clockwise patterns are brighter than galaxies with counterclockwise patterns. The magnitude of that difference changes across RA ranges, and exhibits a strong correlation with the cosine of the right ascension.

We have measured the 2.3 GHz total and correlated flux densities on a baseline of 275 km of all sources in the Parkes catalogue which

1. (i) are south of declination +10°,

2. (ii) have a catalogued 2.7 GHz total flux density exceeding 0.5 Jy, and

3. (iii) have a 2.7/5.0 GHz spectral index flatter than −0.5.

More than 14% of the sample showed visibility amplitudes greater than 0.9, and more than 72% showed visibility amplitudes greater than 0.5. Of the sources with optical or other identifications 79% were quasars. In this paper we briefly summarise the results of this survey.

In their study of the evolution of galaxies within clusters, Butcher and Oemler discovered evidence for a strong evolution in star-formation rate with redshift. Later studies confirmed this conclusion and uncovered several aspects of the effect: photometric, spectroscopic, and morphological. This article reviews a broad sample of these works and discusses selection effects, biases, and driving mechanisms that might be responsible for the changes in star-formation rate.

Pulsar wind nebulae (PWN) are fascinating systems and archetypal sources for high-energy astrophysics in general. Due to their vicinity, brightness, to the fact that they shine at multi-wavelengths, and especially to their long-living emission at gamma rays, modelling their properties is particularly important for the correct interpretation of the visible Galaxy. A complication in this respect is the variety of properties and morphologies they show at different ages. Here, we discuss the differences among the evolutionary phases of PWN, how they have been modeled in the past and what progresses have been recently made. We approach the discussion from a phenomenological, theoretical (especially numerical) and observational point of view, with particular attention to the most recent results and open questions about the physics of such intriguing sources.

Observations of cloud structure over the last 10 years have led to the conclusion that it is fractal in nature, with a fractal dimension characteristic of turbulence, as found in the laboratory. Such structure has an open texture, with a volume filling factor of nearly 90% for gas that is at low density. Turbulence makes such cavities by clearing away material during convective motions. We propose that most of the low-density intercloud medium is the result of turbulence and not overlapping supernova remnants. This model has important implications for diffuse Hα and ionisation of the halo. Fractal clouds have a gradually decreasing average density with increasing distance, so ionisation zones around these clouds can be very extensive. Fractal clouds are also highly clustered, making the mean free path for ionising photons at least twice as large as in the ‘standard cloud’ model. This long mean free path allows stray ionising photons from midplane H II regions to reach and ionise the halo.

Flux density monitoring data at 2.3 and 8.4 GHz is presented for a sample of 33 southern hemisphere GPS sources, drawn from the 2.7 GHz Parkes survey. This monitoring data, together with VLBI monitoring data, shows that a small fraction of these sources, ∼10%, vary. Their variability falls into several categories: sources whose spectral classification is, at best, ephemeral on a timescale of years; sources with a stable GPS classification that vary, but retain their classification; and a small number of sources that exhibit interstellar scintillation, but that maintain a mean GPS spectrum. Existing data on GPS sources with higher frequency peaks, ≥3 GHz, reveals that many such sources vary. However, the majority of these sources possess a GPS spectrum only during outbursts, and hence should perhaps be classified as ephemeral GPS sources. In addition, significant levels of circular polarisation have been found in a number of GPS sources, both amongst the variables and non-variables. Remarkable amongst these is PKS 1519–273, which possesses strong and variable circular polarisation, and which exhibits IDV in all Stokes parameters.

Radio continuum emission due to thermal bremsstrahlung and optical Hα spectral line emission arise from processes involving similar atomic entities and physical conditions. The relationship between the flux density of the emission from the two processes is mainly a function of the electron temperature of the emitting region, modified by other factors such as the mode of radiation transfer in the hydrogen spectrum. On the other hand, radio continuum radiation due to non-thermal synchrotron emission is formed by species and processes not involved in thermal emission. As a consequence, differences between the observed radio continuum emission and Hα emission from cosmic sources can provide reliable information on a variety of important physical aspects of the sources, including the relative importance of thermal and non-thermal radio emission and the degree of optical obscuration. This paper reviews the theory of the formation of Hα and the radio continuum in the interstellar medium (ISM), discusses some of the factors that must be considered in comparing observations made in the two frequency regimes, and summarises the properties of some classes of galactic object that emit both optical and radio radiation.