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A pulsar timing array (PTA), in which observations of a large sample of pulsars spread across the celestial sphere are combined, allows investigation of global phenomena such as a background of gravitational waves or instabilities in atomic timescales that produce correlated timing residuals in the pulsars of the array. The Parkes Pulsar Timing Array (PPTA) is an implementation of the PTA concept based on observations with the Parkes 64-m radio telescope. A sample of 20 millisecond pulsars is being observed at three radio-frequency bands, 50cm (~700 MHz), 20cm (~1400 MHz) and 10cm (~3100 MHz), with observations at intervals of 2 - 3 weeks. Regular observations commenced in early 2005. This paper describes the systems used for the PPTA observations and data processing, including calibration and timing analysis. The strategy behind the choice of pulsars, observing parameters and analysis methods is discussed. Results are presented for PPTA data in the three bands taken between 2005 March and 2011 March. For ten of the 20 pulsars, rms timing residuals are less than 1 microsec for the best band after fitting for pulse frequency and its first time derivative. Significant red timing noise is detected in about half of the sample. We discuss the implications of these results on future projects including the International Pulsar Timing Array (IPTA) and a PTA based on the Square Kilometre Array. We also present an extended PPTA data set that combines PPTA data with earlier Parkes timing data for these pulsars.
We describe 14 years of public data from the Parkes Pulsar Timing Array (PPTA), an ongoing project that is producing precise measurements of pulse times of arrival from 26 millisecond pulsars using the 64-m Parkes radio telescope with a cadence of ap
Pulsar timing is a technique that uses the highly stable spin periods of neutron stars to investigate a wide range of topics in physics and astrophysics. Pulsar timing arrays (PTAs) use sets of extremely well-timed pulsars as a Galaxy-scale detector
The main goal of pulsar timing array experiments is to detect correlated signals such as nanohertz-frequency gravitational waves. Pulsar timing data collected in dense monitoring campaigns can also be used to study the stars themselves, their binary
The Parkes Pulsar Timing Array project aims to make a direct detection of a gravitational-wave background through timing of millisecond pulsars. In this article, the main requirements for that endeavour are described and recent and ongoing progress i
The first direct detection of gravitational waves may be made through observations of pulsars. The principal aim of pulsar timing array projects being carried out worldwide is to detect ultra-low frequency gravitational waves (f ~ 10^-9 to 10^-8 Hz).