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03-02-2009
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e-VLBI kick-off at the IYA 2009 a great success

Submitter: Paul Boven
Description: The international 'Year of Astronomy 2009' opening ceremony was held at the UNESCO headquarters in Paris on the 15th and 16th of January. Astronomers, dignitaries and students attended this affair and there was a lot of press coverage. There were lectures and demonstrations, and EXPReS showcased a marathon 33-hour e-VLBI observation.

17 radio telescopes on 5 continents (Europe, Asia, Australia, North America and South America) contributed to the observation, making this a truly global event. The longest baseline in this observation was between Hobart (Tasmania, Australia) and Jodrell Bank (UK), a distance of 12486km (98% of the Earth's diameter).

The attendees in Paris, and visitors from all over the world, were able to witness this observation live on a special website ( http://www.expres-eu.org/iya2009 ). We continuously updated the intermediate results from our processing pipeline, demonstrating how the image quality of a VLBI observation improves with time.

The image above shows a sequence of properly calibrated images of J0240+15, at 1.2, 2.5 and 19 hours into the observation.
Copyright: JIVE
 
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