• Journal of the Institute of Convergence Signal Processing
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• v.12 no.4
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• pp.322-332
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• 2011

In this paper, we introduce the 1st performance evaluation of VLBI Correlation Subsystem (VCS) main product, which is core system of Korea-Japan Joint VLBI Correlator (KJJVC). The main goal of the 1st performance evaluation of VCS main product is that the perfection of overall system will be enhanced after checking the unsolved part by performing the experiments towards various test items at the manufacturer before installation of field. The functional test was performed by including the overflow problem occurred in the FFT re-quantization module due to the insufficient of effective bit at the VCS trial product in this performance test of VCS main product. Through the performance test for VCS main product in the factory, the problem such as FFT re-quantization discovered at performance test of VCS trial product in 2008 was clearly solved and the important functions such as delay tracking, daly compensation, and frequency bining were added in this VCS main product. We also confirmed that the predicted correlation results (fringe) was obtained in the correlation test by using real astronomical observed data(wideband/narrow band).

• Publications of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.91-107
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• 2008

In this paper, we introduce the performance evaluation and development of Raw VLBI Data Buffer(RVDB) system for the synchronized playback processing of observed data in Korea-Japan Joint VLBI Correlator(KJJVC). The high-speed correlation processing system is under development so that the radio data obtained with 8192 channels and 8 Gbps speed from 16 stations will be able to be processed. When the recorded data of each station are played to correlator, the time synchronization of each station is very important because the correlator should process the data obtained with same time and condition. There are many types of recorder systems in the East Asia VLBI Network (EAVN). Therefore it is required to prepare the special time synchronized playback processing system to synchronize the time tag of observed data. The developed RVDB system consists of Data Input Output(DIO), 10GbE switch, and Disk Data Buffer(DDB). It can record the data with maximum 2 Gbps speed, and can play back the data to correlator with nominal 2 Gbps speed. To enable to play back the data of different playback system to the correlator, we developed the high-speed time synchronized playback processing system. We carried out the experiments of playing back and correlation for gigabit correlator and VCS trial product so as to confirm the performance of developed time synchronized playback processing system. In case of online and offline playing back experiment for gigabit correlator, we confirmed that the online and offline correlation results were the same. In case of playing back experiment for VCS trial product, we verified that the wide band and narrow band correlation results were also the same. Through the playing back experiments of RVDB system, the effectiveness of developed RVDB system was verified. In this paper, the system design, construction and experimental results are shown briefly.

• Publications of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.24 no.1
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• pp.65-81
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• 2009

We present the performance test results of VLBI Correlation Subsystem (VCS) trial product which was being developed for 1 year from August 2007. It is a core component of Korea-Japan Joint VLBI Correlator (KJJVC). The aim for developing VCS trial product is to improve the performance of VCS main product to reduce the efforts and cost, and to solve the design problems by performing the preliminary test of the manufactured trial product. The function of VCS trial product is that it is able to process the 2 stations-1 baseline, 8 Gbps/station speed, 1.2 Gbps output speed with FX-type. VCS trial product consists of Read Data Control Board (RDC), Fourier Transform Board (FTB), and Correlation and Accumulation Board (CAB). Almost main functions are integrated in the FTB and CAB board. In order to confirm the performance of VCS trial product functions, the spectral analysis, delay compensation and correlation processing experiments were carried out by using simulation and real observation data. We found that the overflow problem of re-quantization after FFT processing was occurred in the delay compensation experiment. We confirmed that this problem was caused by valid bit-expression of the re-quantized data. To solve this problem, the novel method will be applied to VCS main product. The effectiveness of VCS trial product has been verified through the preliminary experimental results, but the overflow problem was occurred.

• Journal of the Institute of Convergence Signal Processing
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• v.19 no.4
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• pp.153-161
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• 2018

This paper describes the performance improvement of Software (SW) digital filter using GPU (Graphical Processing Unit). The previous developed SW digital filter has a problem that it operates on a CPU (Central Processing Unit) basis and has a slow speed. The GPU was introduced to filter the data of the EAVN (East Asian VLBI Network) observation to improve the operation speed and to process data with other stations through filtering, respectively. In order to enhance the computational speed of the SW digital filter, NVIDIA Titan V GPU board with built-in Tensor Core is used. The processing speed of about 0.78 (1Gbps, 16MHz BW, 16-IF) and 1.1 (2Gbps, 32MHz BW, 16-IF) times for the observing time was achieved by filtering the 95 second observation data of 2 Gbps (512 MHz BW, 1-IF), respectively. In addition, 2Gbps data is digitally filtered for the 1 and 2Gbps simultaneously observed with KVN (Korean VLBI Network), and compared with the 1Gbps, we obtained similar values such as cross power spectrum, phase, and SNR (Signal to Noise Ratio). As a result, the effectiveness of developed SW digital filter using GPU in this research was confirmed for utilizing the data processing and analysis. In the future, it is expected that the observation data will be able to be filtered in real time when the distributed processing optimization of source code for using multiple GPU boards.

• Journal of the Institute of Convergence Signal Processing
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.13-20
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• 2017

In this paper, we evaluate the basic test results of the 32 Gbps observational equipment introduced as the back-end system for the wideband VLBI (Very Long Baseline Interferometry) observation of KVN (Korean VLBI Network). Radio astronomers want to make a large radio telescope that has excellent performance in order to observe the superfine structure of a celestial body, but a lot of money is needed. Therefore, in order to increase the sensitivity, the performance improvement of the receiving system and the method of observing the wide frequency bandwidth are introduced. To do this, we adopted a wideband sampling method for converting analog signals to digital with ultra-fast speeds and a wideband sampler for performing digital filtering in order to observe a wide observational frequency bandwidth. The wideband sampler (OCTAD-K) supports up to 16 Gsps-2bits sampling and supports a variety of observational bandwidth using digital filtering techniques. In particular, it is designed to support KVN's 4-frequency simultaneous observation system and VERA(VLBI Exploration of Radio Astrometry)'s 2-beam observation system. It can also support polKVN(Korean VLBI Network), KaVA(KVN and VERA Array), 32Gbps Direct Sampler, Digital Filter, Widebandarization observations and supports the standard VDIF(VLBI Data Interchange Format) format of observed data. In this paper, the performance of the system and the problem solving are described in detail after performing the factory inspection and field test before the system is introduced.

• Publications of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.27 no.1
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• pp.1-16
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• 2012

In this paper, we describe the installation of VLBI Correlation Subsystem (VCS) main product and its performance at the Korea-Japan Correlation Center (KJCC). The VCS main product was installed at KJCC in August 2009. For the overall performance evaluation of VCS, playbacks, Raw VLBI Data Buffer (RVDB) system, and Data Archive (DA) system were installed together. The VCS main product was connected between RVDB and DA, and the correlation results were put into the DA to confirm the normal operation of VCS 16 station mode configuration. The evaluation test was first performed with 4 station mode, same as the factory test of VCS main product. Based on the results of 4 station mode, the same evaluation test was conducted for 16 station mode of VCS. We found that the correlation results of VCS were almost similarly compared to those of the Mitaka FX Correlator. Through the test results, we confirmed that the problems such as spectrum errors, delay parameter processing module and field programmable gate array errors in antenna unit, which were generated at the factory test of VCS main product, were clearly solved. And we verified the performance and connectivity of VCS by obtaining the expected correlation results and we also confirmed that the performance of VCS was sufficient for real VLBI observation data in both 4 and 16 station modes.

• Journal of the Institute of Convergence Signal Processing
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• v.16 no.4
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• pp.139-148
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• 2015

In this paper, the optimum coding method is proposed by using open library in order to improve the performance of a software correlator developed for Korea-Japan Joint VLBI Correlator(KJJVC). The correlation system for VLBI observing system is generally implemented with hardware using ASIC or FPGA because the computational quantity is increased geometrically according to the participated observatory number. However, the software correlation system is recently constructed at a massive server such as a cluster using software according to the development of computing power. Since VLBI correlator implemented with hardware is able to conduct data processing with real-time or quasi real-time compared with mostly observational time, software correlation has to perform optimal data processing in coding work so as to have the same performance as that of the hardware. Therefore, in this paper, the experimental comparison was conducted by open-source based fftw library released in FFT processing stage, which is the most important part of the correlator system for performing optimum coding work in software development phase, such as general method using fftw library or methods using SSE(Streaming SIMD Extensions), shared memory, or OpenMP, and method using merged techniques listed above. Through the experimental results, the proposed optimum coding method for improving the performance of developed software correlator using fftw library, shared memory and OpenMP is effectively confirmed by reducing correlation time compared with conventional method.

• Journal of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.52 no.5
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• pp.207-216
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• 2019

In this paper we introduce a software package, the Very long baseline interferometry Network SIMulator (VNSIM), which provides an integrated platform assisting radio astronomers to design Very Long Baseline Interferometry (VLBI) experiments and evaluate the network performance, with a user-friendly interface. Though VNSIM is primarily motivated by the East Asia VLBI Network, it can also be used for other VLBI networks and generic interferometers. The software package not only integrates the functionality of plotting (u, v) coverage, scheduling the observation, and displaying the dirty and CLEAN images, but also adds new features including sensitivity calculations for a given VLBI network. VNSIM provides flexible interactions on both command line and graphical user interface and offers friendly support for log reports and database management. Multi-processing acceleration is also supported, enabling users to handle large survey data. To facilitate future developments and updates, all simulation functions are encapsulated in separate Python modules, allowing independent invoking and testing. In order to verify the performance of VNSIM, we performed simulations and compared the results with other simulation tools, showing good agreement.

• Journal of the Institute of Convergence Signal Processing
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.55-63
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• 2014

In this paper, we introduce the performance evaluation of data archive system for saving correlation result of Daejeon correlator with high-data rate. Daejeon correlator supports various correlation modes, but the speed of correlation result is affected by correlator according to the integration time in each mode. Maximum data rate of Daejeon correlator is 1.4GB/s in case of C1 mode with 25.6ms integration time. In this research, the performance evaluation of the proposed data archive system is conducted for saving correlation results connected with 4 10GbE optical cable with VCS (VLBI Correlation Subsystem), which is the core system of Daejeon correlator. For the experiments, the data archive system for 2 benders was selected and benchmark test was performed. In this paper, the developed data generation program of VCS correlation result file for benchmark test and evaluation results are described.

• Journal of the Institute of Convergence Signal Processing
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.55-61
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• 2017

In radio astronomy, high-capacity HDDs are being used to save huge amounts of HDDs in order to record the observational data. For VLBI observations, observational speeds increase and huge amounts of observational data must be stored as they expand to broadband. As the HDD is frequently used, the number of failures occurred, and then it takes a lot of time to recover it. In addition, if a failed HDD is continuously used, observational data loss occurs. And it costs a lot of money to buy a new HDD. In this study, we developed the integrity verification system of the Serial ATA HDD using FirmOS. The FirmOS is an OS that has been developed to function exclusively for specific purposes on a system having a general server board and CPU. The developed system performs the process of writing and reading specific patterns of data in a physical area of the SATA HDD based on a FirmOS. In addition, we introduced a method to investigate the integrity of HDD integrity by comparing it with the stored pattern data from the HDD controller. Using the developed system, it was easy to determine whether the disk pack used in VLBI observations has error or not, and it is very useful to improve the observation efficiency. This paper introduces the detail for the design, configuration, testing, etc. of the SATA HDD integrity verification system developed.