Evaluation of VLBI Observations with Sensitivity and Robustness Analyses

Pakize Küreç Nehbit, Robert Heinkelmann, Harald Schuh, Susanne Glaser, Susanne Lunz, Nicat Mammadaliyev, Kyriakos Balidakis, Haluk Konak and Emine Tanır Kayıkçı
Additional contact information
Pakize Küreç Nehbit: Department of Geomatics Engineering, Kocaeli University, Kocaeli 41001, Turkey
Robert Heinkelmann: GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences, 14473 Potsdam, Germany
Harald Schuh: GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences, 14473 Potsdam, Germany
Susanne Glaser: GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences, 14473 Potsdam, Germany
Susanne Lunz: GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences, 14473 Potsdam, Germany
Nicat Mammadaliyev: GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences, 14473 Potsdam, Germany
Kyriakos Balidakis: GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences, 14473 Potsdam, Germany
Haluk Konak: Department of Geomatics Engineering, Kocaeli University, Kocaeli 41001, Turkey
Emine Tanır Kayıkçı: Department of Geomatics Engineering, Karadeniz Technical University, Trabzon 61080, Turkey

Mathematics, 2020, vol. 8, issue 6, 1-15

Abstract: Very Long Baseline Interferometry (VLBI) plays an indispensable role in the realization of global terrestrial and celestial reference frames and in the determination of the full set of the Earth Orientation Parameters (EOP). The main goal of this research is to assess the quality of the VLBI observations based on the sensitivity and robustness criteria. Sensitivity is defined as the minimum displacement value that can be detected in coordinate unknowns. Robustness describes the deformation strength induced by the maximum undetectable errors with the internal reliability analysis. The location of a VLBI station and the total weights of the observations at the station are most important for the sensitivity analysis. Furthermore, the total observation number of a radio source and the quality of the observations are important for the sensitivity levels of the radio sources. According to the robustness analysis of station coordinates, the worst robustness values are caused by atmospheric delay effects with high temporal and spatial variability. During CONT14, it is determined that FORTLEZA, WESTFORD, and TSUKUB32 have robustness values changing between 0.8 and 1.3 mm, which are significantly worse in comparison to the other stations. The radio sources 0506-612, NRAO150, and 3C345 have worse sensitivity levels compared to other radio sources. It can be concluded that the sensitivity and robustness analysis are reliable measures to obtain high accuracy VLBI solutions.

Keywords: very long baseline interferometry; sensitivity; internal reliability; robustness; CONT14 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2227-7390/8/6/939/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2227-7390/8/6/939/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jmathe:v:8:y:2020:i:6:p:939-:d:368776

Access Statistics for this article

Mathematics is currently edited by Ms. Emma He

More articles in Mathematics from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().