Zero-polarization candidate regions for calibration of wide-field optical polarimeters

التفاصيل البيبلوغرافية
العنوان: Zero-polarization candidate regions for calibration of wide-field optical polarimeters
المؤلفون: Mandarakas, N., Panopoulou, G. V., Pelgrims, V., Potter, S. B., Pavlidou, V., Ramaprakash, A., Tassis, K., Blinov, D., Kiehlmann, S., Koutsiona, E., Maharana, S., Romanopoulos, S., Skalidis, R., Vervelaki, A., Clark, S. E., Kypriotakis, J. A., Readhead, A. C. S.
سنة النشر: 2023
المجموعة: Astrophysics
مصطلحات موضوعية: Astrophysics - Solar and Stellar Astrophysics, Astrophysics - Astrophysics of Galaxies, Astrophysics - Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics
الوصف: Context. Calibration of optical polarimeters relies on the use of stars with negligible polarization (unpolarized standard stars) for determining the instrumental polarization zero-point. For wide-field polarimeters, calibration is often done by imaging the same star over multiple positions in the field of view - a process which is time-consuming. A more effective technique is to target fields containing multiple standard stars. While this method has been used for fields with highly polarized stars, there are no such sky regions with well-measured unpolarized standard stars. Aims. We aim to identify sky regions with tens of stars exhibiting negligible polarization, which are suitable for zero-point calibration of wide-field polarimeters. Methods. We selected stars in regions with extremely low reddening, located at high Galactic latitudes. We targeted four ~ 400 x 400 fields in the northern, and eight in the southern Equatorial hemisphere. Observations were carried out at the Skinakas Observatory and the South African Astronomical Observatory respectively. Results. We find two fields in the North and seven in the South with mean polarization lower than p < 0.1%. Conclusions. At least nine out of twelve fields can be used for zero-point calibration of wide-field polarimeters.
Comment: 15 pages, 25 figures
نوع الوثيقة: Working Paper
URL الوصول: http://arxiv.org/abs/2312.06435
رقم الأكسشن: edsarx.2312.06435
قاعدة البيانات: arXiv