Currently, we are performing a large-scale survey of molecular clouds toward the Galactic Plane in 12CO, 13CO, and C18O(J = 2–1) with the 1.85-m mm-submm telescope from Nobeyama Radio Observatory. In addition, we are proceeding with the preparation of a new project to observe several additional molecular lines including higher transitions of CO isotopes, such as 12CO, 13CO, and C18O(J = 2–1, 3–2) simultaneously with a wideband receiver (210–375 GHz). The optics has a Cassegrain reflector antenna with Nasmyth beam-waveguide feed and is composed of Main-reflector, Sub-reflector, ellipsoidal mirrors, and plane mirrors. New wideband optics will be required to achieve this goal. In order to accomplish the optics, we have designed a corrugated horn with a fractional bandwidth of ∼56 %, and frequency independent optics to couple the beam from the telescope onto the horn. The corrugated horn has a conical profile and the variable corrugation depth. It has been optimized by using CHAMP, our targeting return loss of better than −20 dB, cross-polarization loss of better than −25 dB, and far-field good radiation pattern. The simulation of the corrugated horn results in low return loss, low crosspolarization, and symmetric beam pattern in that frequency band. The simulated aperture efficiency of the designed receiver optics on the 1.85-m telescope is above 0.76 at all frequencies by using GRASP. Recently, we have succeeded in simultaneous observation of 12CO, 13CO, and C18O(J = 2–1 and 3–2) toward Orion KL with the optics for the first time.
The 1.85-m mm-submm telescope has been operated at Nobeyama Radio Observatory to observe molecular clouds in the nearby Galactic Plane based on the molecular lines of 12CO, 13CO, C18O(J = 2–1). We are planning to relocate the telescope to a site (∼2,500 m) at the Atacama Desert in Chile and to newly install a dual-band receiver for simultaneous observations of lines of CO isotopes with the transitions of J = 2–1 and J = 3–2. In order to achieve this goal, we have developed a wideband diplexer to separate radio frequency (RF) 211–275 GHz (ALMA Band 6) and 275–373 GHz (ALMA Band 7). We adopted a waveguide type FrequencySeparation Filters (FSF) as the basic concept of the wideband diplexer in 210–375 GHz. The wideband diplexer (α) has already been fabricated and measured as the prototype, and we thus obtained reasonable performance in the CO lines band. On the other hand, the measurement result indicates the return loss is relatively worse in 280–300 GHz, although it doesn’t affect the simultaneous observations of 230 GHz and 345 GHz band. We carried out 3D shape measurement with an optical microscope, and then, found that there are machining errors in the parts of the resonator in High Pass Filter. The analysis based on electromagnetic simulation reveals that the errors significantly affect return loss around cut-off frequency. In this paper, we describes the design of the waveguide diplexer, S-parameter measurement, and detailed analysis to verify the discrepancy between simulation and measurement.
We report the current status of the 1.85-m mm-submm telescope installed at the Nobeyama Radio Observatory (altitude 1400 m) and the future plan. The scientific goal is to reveal the physical/chemical properties of molecular clouds in the Galaxy by obtaining large-scale distributions of molecular gas with an angular resolution of several arcminutes. A semi-automatic observation system created mainly in Python on Linux-PCs enables effective operations. A large-scale CO J =2–1 survey of the molecular clouds (e.g., Orion-A/B, Cygnus-X/OB7, Taurus- California-Perseus complex, and Galactic Plane), and a pilot survey of emission lines from minor molecular species toward Orion clouds have been conducted so far. The telescope also is providing the opportunities for technical demonstrations of new devices and ideas. For example, the practical realizations of PLM (Path Length Modulator) and waveguide-based sideband separating filter, installation of the newly designed waveguide-based circular polarizer and OMT (Orthomode Transducer), and so on. As the next step, we are now planning to relocate the telescope to San Pedro de Atacama in Chile (altitude 2500 m), and are developing very wideband receiver covering 210–375 GHz (corresponding to Bands 6–7 of ALMA) and full-automatic observation system. The new telescope system will provide large-scale data in the spatial and frequency domain of molecular clouds of Galactic plane and Large/Small Magellanic Clouds at the southern hemisphere. The data will be precious for the comparison with those of extra-galactic ones that will be obtained with ALMA as the Bands 6/7 are the most efficient frequency bands for the surveys in extra-galaxies for ALMA.
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