Tropospheric delay modelling and the celestial reference frame at radio wavelengths

Abstract

Aims. We examine the relationship between Very Long Baseline Interferometry (VLBI) tropospheric delay modelling and source positions. In particular, the effect of a priori ray-traced slant delays on source declination is investigated. Methods. We estimated source coordinates as global positions from 5830 geodetic VLBI sessions incorporating about 10 million group delay measurements. This data set was used for the International Celestial Reference Frame 3 (ICRF3) prototype solutions as of December 2016. Results. We report on a significant bias in source declination of about 50 μas, which can be found between a normal solution and a solution where a priori ray-traced slant delays are used. More traditional tropospheric delay modelling techniques, such as a priori gradients, are tested as well. Significant differences of about 30 μas in declination can only be found when absolute constraints are used for a priori gradient models. Further, we find that none of these models decrease the declination bias between ICRF3 prototype solutions and ICRF2.