Foregrounds for redshifted 21-cm studies of reionization: Giant Meter Wave Radio Telescope 153-MHz observations

Abstract

Foreground subtraction is the biggest challenge for future redshifted 21-cm observations to probe reionization. We use a short Giant Meter Wave Radio Telescope (GMRT) observation at 153 MHz to characterize the statistical properties of the background radiation across ^~1° to subarcmin angular scales, and across a frequency band of 5 MHz with 62.5 kHz resolution. The statistic we use is the visibility correlation function, or equivalently the angular power spectrum Cl. We present the results obtained from using relatively unsophisticated, conventional data calibration procedures. We find that even fairly simple-minded calibration allows one to estimate the visibility correlation function at a given frequency V₂(U, 0). From our observations, we find that V₂(U, 0) is consistent with foreground model predictions at all angular scales except the largest ones probed by our observations where the model predictions are somewhat in excess. On the other hand, the visibility correlation between different frequencies κ(U, Δν) seems to be much more sensitive to calibration errors. We find a rapid decline in κ(U, Δν), in contrast with the prediction of less than 1 per cent variation across 2.5 MHz. In this case, however, it seems likely that a substantial part of the discrepancy may be due to limitations of data reduction procedures.