Acknowledgments
Declaration
Abstract
1 Introduction
 1.1 Synchrotron Radiation
 1.2 Galactic Supernova Remnants
  1.2.1 Nonthermal Emission from SNRs
  1.2.2 Continuum Radio Spectra
  1.2.3 Thermal emission
  1.2.4 Radio morphology
  1.2.5 Galactic distribution
 1.3 Effects of the ISM on the observed properties of SNRs
 1.4 Why low frequency?
 1.5 Aperture synthesis at low frequencies
  1.5.1 Phase fluctuations
  1.5.2 Non-coplanar baselines
  1.5.3 On-line and off-line data analysis
  1.5.4 Instrumental polarization leakage
 1.6 Organization of the thesis
2 The Giant Meterwave Radio Telescope
 2.1 Principles of aperture synthesis
  2.1.1 Interferometry in practice
 2.2 The Array
 2.3 Signal flow
 2.4 Telescope parameters
 2.5 The GMRT correlator
  2.5.1 Overview
  2.5.2 Delay compensation
  2.5.3 Imaging modes
 2.6 Baseline and fixed delay calibration
  2.6.1 Baseline calibration
  2.6.2 Fixed delay calibration
3 Data analysis software
 3.1 Introduction
 3.2 The software design
  3.2.1 On-line usage of the software
 3.3 Data manipulation libraries
  3.3.1 The LTAFMT Object
  3.3.2 The LTAVIEW object
  3.3.3 The LTARec object
 3.4 The user interface for off-line programs
 3.5 Data analysis and display programs
  3.5.1 The program xtract and its variants
  3.5.2 The rantsol and badbase programs
  3.5.3 The closure program
  3.5.4 Conversion to FITS format
  3.5.5 Miscellaneous programs
4 The GMRT Data
 4.1 GMRT Observations
 4.2 Low frequency specific problems
  4.2.1 Mapping with non co-planar arrays
  4.2.2 Bandwidth Smearing
 4.3 Observational procedure
  4.3.1 On-line monitoring
 4.4 Data Analysis
  4.4.1 Data Editing
  4.4.2 Data Editing and Calibration in AIPS
 4.5 Inversion and deconvolution of GMRT data
 4.6 The Images
5 Observations of Supernova Remnants
 5.1 Introduction
 5.2 Candidate SNRs
  5.2.1 G001.4-0.1
  5.2.2 G003.8+0.3
  5.2.3 G004.2-0.0
  5.2.4 G004.8+6.2
  5.2.5 G356.3-1.5
  5.2.6 G356.2+4.5
  5.2.7 G358.0+3.8
 5.3 Continuum flux densities of known SNRs
  5.3.1 G003.7-0.2
  5.3.2 G355.9-2.5
  5.3.3 Kepler’s SNR (G004.5+6.8)
 5.4 Discussion
6 Other objects in the fields
 6.1 Introduction
 6.2 Point sources in the fields
 6.3 Extended sources
  6.3.1 G003.6-0.11
  6.3.2 Linear structure in the field of G356.3-1.5
 6.4 Extended emission around Ultra Compact HII regions
  6.4.1 G004.417+0.126
  6.4.2 G003.349-0.076
 6.5 Discussion
7 Measurement of polarization leakage
 7.1 Introduction
 7.2 Motivation
 7.3 Algorithm and simulation
  7.3.1 The leaky antsol
  7.3.2 Results of the simulations
 7.4 Real data
  7.4.1 150 MHz data
  7.4.2 L-band data with circular feed
 7.5 Closure phase and the Poincaré sphere
 7.6 Non-uniqueness of solutions
 7.7 Conclusions
8 Conclusions
 8.1 Using the Giant Meterwave Radio Telescope
  8.1.1 Testing and debugging
  8.1.2 Software development
 8.2 Candidate Galactic SNRs
 8.3 Other sources in the fields
 8.4 Future directions
 8.5 Some thoughts on the role of software for the GMRT
A The user interface for off-line applications
 A.1 The User interface commands
  A.1.1 De-referencing mechanism
  A.1.2 File name convention
 A.2 Customization
  A.2.1 The help keyword
B The xtract macro language
 B.1 The macro language
 B.2 Output filters
 B.3 Internal design
  B.3.1 Macro compilation
  B.3.2 Macro execution
 B.4 Programming with the xtract library
  B.4.1 Interpretation and compilation of the format string
  B.4.2 Execution of the compiled macro
  B.4.3 The Parameters structure
 B.5 Adding new elements to the syntax
C Antenna/baseline naming convention
 C.1 Antenna naming convention
 C.2 Baseline naming convention
  C.2.1 Examples
D Computation of antenna based complex gains
 D.1 Interpretation of the equation
 D.2 Estimation of the system temperature (T^s)
 D.3 Derivation of g_i using real and imaginary parts