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Development of a Pulsar-Based Time-Scale

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2012
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Journal Article

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Hobbs, G and Coles, W and Manchester, R and Keith, M and Shannon, R and Chen, D and Bailes, M. et al. 2012. Development of a Pulsar-Based Time-Scale. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 427 (4): pp. 2780-2787.
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Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
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International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research
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This article has been published in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. © 2012 The Authors. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Royal Astronomical Society. All rights reserved.

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Abstract

Using observations of pulsars from the Parkes Pulsar Timing Array (PPTA) project we develop the first pulsar-based time-scale that has a precision comparable to the uncertainties in International Atomic Time-scales (TAI). Our ensemble of pulsars provides an Ensemble Pulsar Scale (EPS) analogous to the free atomic time-scale Échelle Atomique Libre. The EPS can be used to detect fluctuations in atomic time-scales and therefore can lead to a new realization of Terrestrial Time, TT(PPTA11). We successfully follow features known to affect the frequency of the TAI, and we find marginally significant differences between TT(PPTA11) and TT(BIPM11). We discuss the various phenomena that lead to a correlated signal in the pulsar timing residuals and therefore limit the stability of the pulsar time-scale.