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Temporal statistical position stability is required for VLBI sources to define a stable Celestial Reference Frame (CRF) and has been studied in many recent papers. This study analyzes the sources from the latest realization of the International Celestial Reference Frame (ICRF2) with the Allan variance, in addition to taking into account the apparent linear motions of the sources. Focusing on the 295 defining sources shows how they are a good compromise of different criteria, such as statistical stability and sky distribution, as well as having a sufficient number of sources, despite the fact that the most stable sources of the entire ICRF2 are mostly in the Northern Hemisphere. Nevertheless, the selection of a stable set is not unique: studying different solutions (GSF005a and AUG24 from GSFC and OPA from the Paris Observatory) over different time periods (1989.5 to 2009.5 and 1999.5 to 2009.5) leads to selections that can differ in up to 20% of the sources. Observing, recording, and network improvement are some of the causes, showing better stability for the CRF over the last decade than the last twenty years. But this may also be explained by the assumption of stationarity that is not necessarily right for some sources.

The purpose of the Russian VLBI "Quasar" Network is to carry out astrometrical and geodynamical investigations. Since 2006 purely domestic observational programs with data processing at the IAA correlator have been carried out. To maintain these geodynamical programs e-VLBI technology is being developed and tested. This paper describes the IAA activity of developing a real-time VLBI system using high-speed digital communication links.

The Chinese Data Acquisition System (CDAS) based on FPGA techniques has been developed in China for the purpose of replacing the traditional analog baseband converter. CDAS is a high speed data acquisition and processing system with 1024 Msps sample rate for 512M bandwidth input and up to 16 channels (both USB and LSB) output with VSI interface compatible. The instrument is a flexible environment which can be updated easily. In this paper, the construction, the performance, the experiment results, and the future plans of CDAS will be reported.

In this paper, we introduce our GPS-VLBI hybrid system and show the results of the first experiment which is now under way. In this hybrid system, GPS signals are captured by a normal GPS antenna, down-converted to IF signals, and then sampled by the VLBI sampler VSSP32 developed by NICT. The sampled GPS data are recorded and correlated in the same way as VLBI observation data. The correlator outputs are the group delay and the delay rate. Since the whole system uses the same frequency standard, many sources of systematic errors are common between the VLBI system and the GPS system. In this hybrid system, the GPS antenna can be regarded as an additional VLBI antenna having multiple beams towards GPS satellites. Therefore, we expect that this approach will provide enough data to improve zenith delay estimates and geodetic results.

The IVS runs two tropospheric products: The IVS tropospheric parameter rapid combination monitors the zenith wet delay (ZWD) and zenith total delay (ZTD) of the rapid turnaround sessions R1 and R4. Goal of the combination is the identification and the exclusion of outliers by comparison and the assessment of the precision of current VLBI solutions in terms of tropospheric parameters. The rapid combination is done on a weekly basis four weeks after the observation files are released on IVS Data Centers. Since tropospheric and geodetic parameters, such as vertical station components, can significantly correlate, the consistency of the ZTD can be a measure of the consistency of the corresponding TRF as well. The ZWD mainly rely on accurate atmospheric pressure data. Thus, besides estimation techniques, modeling and analyst s noise, ZWD reflects differences in the atmospheric pressure data applied to the VLBI analysis. The second product, called tropospheric parameter long-term combination, aims for an accurate determination of climatological signals, such as trends of the atmospheric water vapor observed by VLBI. Therefore, the long-term homogeneity of atmospheric pressure data plays a crucial role for this product. The paper reviews the methods applied and results achieved so far and describes the new maintenance through DGFI.

Within almost all space-geodetic techniques, contributions of different analysis centers (ACs) are combined in order to improve the robustness of the final product. So far, the contributing series are assumed to be independent as each AC processes the observations in different ways. However, the series cannot be completely independent as each analyst uses the same set of original observations and many applied models are subject to conventions used by each AC. In this paper, it is shown that neglecting correlations between the contributing series yields too optimistic formal errors and small, but insignificant, errors in the estimated parameters derived from the adjustment of the combined solution.

Since 2008 the VLBI group at the Institute of Geodesy and Geophysics at TU Vienna has focused on the development of a new VLBI data analysis software called VieVS (Vienna VLBI Software). One part of the program, currently under development, is a unit for parameter estimation in so-called global solutions, where the connection of the single sessions is done by stacking at the normal equation level. We can determine time independent geodynamical parameters such as Love and Shida numbers of the solid Earth tides. Apart from the estimation of the constant nominal values of Love and Shida numbers for the second degree of the tidal potential, it is possible to determine frequency dependent values in the diurnal band together with the resonance frequency of Free Core Nutation. In this paper we show first results obtained from the 24-hour IVS R1 and R4 sessions.

GEOSAT is a multi-technique geodetic analysis software developed at Forsvarets Forsknings Institutt (Norwegian defense research establishment). The Norwegian Mapping Authority has now installed the software and has, together with Forsvarets Forsknings Institutt, adapted the software to deliver datum-free normal equation systems in SINEX format. The goal is to be accepted as an IVS Associate Analysis Center and to provide contributions to the IVS EOP combination on a routine basis. GEOSAT is based on an upper diagonal factorized Kalman filter which allows estimation of time variable parameters like the troposphere and clocks as stochastic parameters. The tropospheric delays in various directions are mapped to tropospheric zenith delay using ray-tracing. Meteorological data from ECMWF with a resolution of six hours is used to perform the ray-tracing which depends both on elevation and azimuth. Other models are following the IERS and IVS conventions. The Norwegian Mapping Authority has submitted test SINEX files produced with GEOSAT to IVS. The results have been compared with the existing IVS combined products. In this paper the outcome of these comparisons is presented.

The UT1 Intensive results heavily depend on the celestial pole offset (CPO) model used during data processing. Since accurate CPO values are available with a delay of two to four weeks, CPO predictions are necessarily applied to the UT1 Intensive data analysis, and errors in the predictions can influence the operational UT1 accuracy. In this paper we assess the real accuracy of CPO prediction using the actual IERS and PUL predictions made in 2007-2009. Also, results of operational processing were analyzed to investigate the actual impact of EOP prediction errors on the rapid UT1 results. It was found that the impact of CPO prediction errors is at a level of several microseconds, whereas the impact of the inaccuracy in the polar motion prediction may be about one order of magnitude larger for ultra-rapid UT1 results. The situation can be amended if the IERS Rapid solution will be updated more frequently.

The space astrometry mission Gaia will construct a dense optical QSO-based celestial reference frame. For consistency between optical and radio positions, it will be important to align the Gaia and VLBI frames (International Celestial Reference Frame) with the highest accuracy. In this respect, it is found that only 10% of the ICRF sources are suitable to establish this link (70 sources), either because most of the ICRF sources are not bright enough at optical wavelengths or because they show extended radio emission which precludes reaching the highest astrometric accuracy. In order to improve the situation, we initiated a multi-step VLBI observational project, dedicated to finding additional suitable radio sources for aligning the two frames. The sample consists of about 450 optically-bright radio sources, typically 20 times weaker than the ICRF sources, which have been selected by cross-correlating optical and radio catalogs. The initial observations, aimed at checking whether these sources are detectable with VLBI, and conducted with the European VLBI Network (EVN) in 2007, showed an excellent 90% detection rate. This paper reports on global VLBI observations carried out in March 2008 to image 105 from the 398 previously detected sources. All sources were successfully imaged, revealing compact VLBI structure for about half of them, which is very promising for the future.

VLBI technology development made significant progress at SHAO in the last few years. The development status of the Chinese DBBC, the software and FPGA-based correlators, and the new VLBI antenna, as well as VLBI applications are summarized in this paper.

Astrometric observations of radio source occultations by solar system bodies may be of large interest for testing gravity theories, dynamical astronomy, and planetary physics. In this paper, we present an updated list of the occultations of astrometric radio sources by planets expected in the coming years. Such events, like solar eclipses, generally speaking can only be observed in a limited region. A map of the shadow path is provided for the events that will occurr in regions with several VLBI stations and hence will be the most interesting for radio astronomy experiments.

Recent investigations have shown significant shortcomings in the model which is proposed by the IERS to account for the variations in the Earth s rotation with periods around one day and less. To overcome this, an empirical model can be estimated more or less directly from the observations of space geodetic techniques. The aim of this paper is to evaluate the quality and reliability of such a model based on VLBI observations. Therefore, the impact of the estimation method and the analysis options as well as the temporal stability are investigated. It turned out that, in order to provide a realistic accuracy measure of the model coefficients, the formal errors should be inflated by a factor of three. This coincides with the noise floor and the repeatability of the model coefficients and it captures almost all of the differences that are caused by different estimation techniques. The impact of analysis options is small but significant when changing troposphere parameterization or including harmonic station position variations.