A new 3 mm band receiver for the Onsala 20 m antenna
Journal article, 2015

A new receiver for the Onsala 20 m antenna with the possibility of being equipped with 3 mm and 4 mm bands has been built and the 3 mm channel has been commissioned during the Spring 2014. For single-dish operation, the receiver uses an innovative on-source/off-source optical switch. In combination with additional optical components and within the same optical layout, the switch provides two calibration loads (for the 3 mm and 4 mm channels), sideband rejection measurement, and tuning possibilities. The optical layout of the receiver employs all cold (4 K) offset elliptical mirrors for both channels, whereas the on-off switch employs flat mirrors only. The 3 mm channel employs a sideband separation (2SB) dual polarization receiver with orthomode transducer (OMT), 4-8 GHz intermediate frequency (IF), x? 2pol x? upper and lower sidebands (USB? +? LSB). The cryostat has four optical windows made of high density polyethylene (HDPE) with anti-reflection corrugations, two for the signal and two for each frequency band cold load. The cryostat uses a two-stage cryocooler produced by Sumitomo HI? RDK? 408D2 with anti-vibration suspension of the cold-head to minimize impact of the vibrations on the receiver stability. The local oscillator (LO) system is based on a Gunn oscillator with aphase lock loop (PLL) and four mechanical tuners for broadband operation, providing independently tunable LO power for each polarization. This paper provides a technical description of the receiver and its technology and could be useful for instrumentation engineers and observers using the Onsala 20 m telescope.

Instrumentation: detectors

Telescopes

Author

Victor Belitsky

Chalmers, Earth and Space Sciences, Advanced Receiver Development

Igor Lapkin

Chalmers, Earth and Space Sciences, Advanced Receiver Development

Mathias Fredrixon

Chalmers, Earth and Space Sciences, Advanced Receiver Development

Erik Sundin

Chalmers, Earth and Space Sciences, Advanced Receiver Development

Leif Helldner

Chalmers, Earth and Space Sciences, Onsala Space Observatory

Lars Pettersson

Chalmers, Earth and Space Sciences, Onsala Space Observatory

Sven-Erik Ferm

Chalmers, Earth and Space Sciences, Advanced Receiver Development

Miroslav Pantaleev

Chalmers, Earth and Space Sciences, Onsala Space Observatory

Bhushan Billade

Chalmers, Earth and Space Sciences, Onsala Space Observatory

Per Bergman

Chalmers, Earth and Space Sciences, Onsala Space Observatory

Henrik Olofsson

Chalmers, Earth and Space Sciences, Onsala Space Observatory

Mikael Lerner

Chalmers, Earth and Space Sciences, Onsala Space Observatory

Magnus Strandberg

Chalmers, Earth and Space Sciences, Advanced Receiver Development

Mark Whale

Chalmers, Earth and Space Sciences, Advanced Receiver Development

Alexey Pavolotskiy

Chalmers, Earth and Space Sciences, Advanced Receiver Development

Jonas Flygare

Chalmers, Earth and Space Sciences, Onsala Space Observatory

Hans Olofsson

Chalmers, Earth and Space Sciences, Onsala Space Observatory

John Conway

Chalmers, Earth and Space Sciences, Onsala Space Observatory

Astronomy and Astrophysics

0004-6361 (ISSN) 1432-0746 (eISSN)

Vol. 580 A29

Infrastructure

Onsala Space Observatory

Subject Categories

Fusion, Plasma and Space Physics

DOI

10.1051/0004-6361/201425573

More information

Created

10/7/2017