Browsing by Author "Schleich, Stella"
Now showing 1 - 1 of 1
Results Per Page
Sort Options
- ItemDesign and implementation of a two-element interferometer(Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2022-04) Schleich, Stella; De Villiers, Dirk; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Engineering. Dept. of Electrical and Electronic Engineering.ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This thesis describes the design and implementation of a two-element interferometer. This is aimed to exhibit the basis of radio astronomy and act as a demonstrator of interferome tery. The instrument consists of two identical channels with three subsystems within the channels. The first is an offset reflector antenna system, where axially corrugated horn antennae are designed as the feed antennae. The second subsystem is a receiver chain, which consists of off-the-shelf components. A dual-conversion superheterodyne receiver is designed to process the radio frequency signal before digitisation. The last subsystem is a digital correlator. This consists of digitisation of the signal and correlation between the two receiver channels which is implemented using Red Pitaya and MATLAB. The system has an operating frequency of 12 GHz with a 60 MHz bandwidth. The chosen source for observation is the sun and the instrument is oriented on a east-west direction, while taking meridian drift scan observations. The observations show that it is possible to detect the sun.