arXiv subjects

Corentin Louis

Publications and source records attributed to Corentin Louis.

7 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Joint Estimation of Properties of the Lunar Subsurface and Galactic Foregrounds with LuSEE-Night

The Lunar Surface Electromagnetics Experiment (LuSEE-Night) is a joint NASA-DOE-ESA low-frequency radio telescope that will reach the lunar far side in 2027. The unknown dielectric properties of the subsurface at the LuSEE-Night landing site impose the most significant limitation for precision instrument calibration, as reflections from the lunar subsurface can change the primary beam at the 10-20% level. Simulations of these effects have provided insight and concern, showing that the lunar subsurface modeled as a lossy dielectric can absorb a large amount of the power of the sky signal. While this absorption may not strongly impact the signal-to-noise ratio in a sky-noise-dominated regime, it could complicate the beam pattern and make the signal more difficult to model and interpret. We have simulated the far-field properties of the LuSEE-Night beam for varying dielectric profiles of the lunar subsurface. We find that varying the properties of the lunar subsurface has the most significant impact around the antenna resonance, impacting its amplitude, position and width. Conversely, changing the properties of the foreground impacts the data across the band. We use a Bayesian inference pipeline to jointly estimate parameters of a galactic foreground model and dielectric properties of the lunar subsurface around the LuSEE-Night landing site and find that parameters of both the galaxy and subsurface properties can be estimated jointly. While the modeling is somewhat idealized, we believe that the results are largely robust owing to the fact that spectral variations for plausible subsurface and galaxy models have very different spectral signatures.

astro-ph.IM↗

arXiv2025

Linear map-making with LuSEE-Night

LuSEE-Night is a pathfinder radio telescope on the lunar far side employing four 3-m monopole antennas arranged as two horizontal cross pseudo-dipoles on a rotational stage and sensitive to the radio sky in the 1-50 MHz frequency band. LuSEE-Night measures the corresponding 16 correlation products as a function of frequency. While each antenna combination measures radiation coming from a large area of the sky, their aggregate information as a function of phase in the lunar cycle and rotational stage position can be deconvolved into a low-resolution map of the sky. We study this deconvolution using linear map-making based on the Wiener filter algorithm. We illustrate how systematic effects can be effectively marginalised over as contributions to the noise covariance and demonstrate this technique on beam knowledge uncertainty and gain fluctuations. With reasonable assumptions about instrument performance, we show that LuSEE-Night should be able to map the sub-50 MHz sky at a ~5-degree resolution.

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arXiv2024

Generation mechanism and beaming of Jovian nKOM from 3D numerical modeling of Juno/Waves observations

The narrowband kilometric radiation (nKOM) is a Jovian low-frequency radio component identified as a plasma emission produced in the region of the Io plasma torus. Measurements from the Waves instrument onboard the Juno spacecraft permitted to establish the distribution of nKOM occurrence and intensity as a function of frequency and latitude. We have developed a 3D geometrical model that can simulate at large scale the plasma emissions occurrence observed by a spacecraft based on an internal Jovian magnetic field model and a diffusive equilibrium model of the plasma density in Jupiter's inner magnetosphere. With this model, we propose a new method to discriminate the generation mechanism, wave mode, beaming and radio source location of plasma emissions. Here, this method is applied to the study of the nKOM observed from all latitudes by the Juno/Waves experiment to identify which conditions reasonably reproduce the observed occurrence distribution versus frequency and latitude. The results allow us to exclude the two main nKOM models published so far, and to show that the emission must be produced at the local plasma frequency and beamed along its local gradient in the direction of decreasing frequencies. We also propose that depending on its latitude, Juno observes two distinct kinds of nKOM: the low frequency nKOM in ordinary mode at high latitudes and high frequency nKOM on extraordinary mode at low latitudes. Both radio source locations are found to be distributed near the centrifugal equator from the outer edge to the inner edge of the Io plasma torus.

astro-ph.EP↗

arXiv2022

Comment on "Locating the source field lines of Jovian decametric radio emissions" by YuMing Wang et al

In this comment of the article [arXiv:2002.01150] "Locating the source field lines of Jovian decametric radio emissions" by YuMing Wang et al., 2020, we discuss the assumptions used by the authors to compute the beaming angle of Jupiter s decametric emissions induced by the moon Io. Their method, relying on multi-point radio observations, was applied to a single event observed on 14th March 2014 by Wind and both STEREO A/B spacecraft from 5 to 16 MHz, and erroneously identified as a northern emission (Io-B type) instead of a southern one (Io-D type). We encourage the authors to update their results with the right hemisphere of origin and to test their method on a larger sample of Jupiter-Io emissions.

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arXiv2020

Digitizing analogic spectrograms recorded by the Nan\c{c}ay Decameter Array on 35 mm film rolls from 1970 to 1990

The Nan\c{c}ay Decameter Array (NDA), which has now passed 40 years old, acquires daily observations of Jovian and Solar low frequency radio emissions over a continuous spectrum ranging from 10 up to 100MHz, forming the largest database of LW radio observations of these two bodies. It also intermittently observed intense radio sources since its opening in 1977. Before that date, decametric observations were conducted on the same site with an interferometer formed of a pair of log-periodic Yagi antennas mounted on mobile booms. These observations have been recorded with a series of analogic recorders (before 1990) and then digital receivers (after 1990), with increasing performances and sensitivities. The NDA scientific team recently retrieved and inventoried the archives of analogic data (35mm film rolls) covering two decades (1970 to 1990). We now plan to digitize those observations, in order to recover their scientific value and to include them into the currently operational database covering a time span starting in 1990 up to now, still adding new files every day. This modern and interoperable database has virtual observatory interfaces. It is a required element to foster scientific data exploitation, including Jovian and Solar data analysis over long timescales. We present the status of this project.

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arXiv2019

MASER: A Science Ready Toolbox for Low Frequency Radio Astronomy

MASER (Measurements, Analysis, and Simulation of Emission in the Radio range) is a comprehensive infrastructure dedicated to time-dependent low frequency radio astronomy (up to about 50 MHz). The main radio sources observed in this spectral range are the Sun, the magnetized planets (Earth, Jupiter, Saturn), and our Galaxy, which are observed either from ground or space. Ground observatories can capture high resolution data streams with a high sensitivity. Conversely, space-borne instruments can observe below the ionospheric cut-off (at about 10 MHz) and can be placed closer to the studied object. Several tools have been developed in the last decade for sharing space physics data. Data visualization tools developed by various institutes are available to share, display and analyse space physics time series and spectrograms. The MASER team has selected a sub-set of those tools and applied them to low frequency radio astronomy. MASER also includes a Python software library for reading raw data from agency archives.

astro-ph.IM↗

arXiv2017

Refurbishing Voyager 1 & 2 Planetary Radio Astronomy (PRA) Data

Voyager/PRA (Planetary Radio Astronomy) data from digitized tapes archived at CNES have been reprocessed and recalibrated. The data cover the Jupiter and Saturn flybys of both Voyager probes. We have also reconstructed goniopolarimetric datasets (flux and polarization) at full resolution. These datasets are currently not available to the scientific community, but they are of primary interest for the analysis of the Cassini data at Saturn, and the Juno data at Jupiter, as well as for the preparation of the JUICE mission. We present the first results derived from the re-analysis of this dataset.

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