The Effelsberg‐Bonn H I survey (EBHIS) comprises an all‐sky survey north of Dec = –5° of the Milky Way and the local volume out to a red‐shift of z ≃ 0.07. Using state of the art Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) spectrometers it is feasible to cover the 100 MHz bandwidth with 16.384 spectral channels. High speed storage of H I spectra allows us to minimize the degradation by Radio Frequency Interference (RFI) signals. Regular EBHIS survey observations started during the winter season 2008/2009 after extensive system evaluation and verification tests. Until today, we surveyed about 8000 square degrees, focusing during the first all‐sky coverage of the Sloan‐Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) area and the northern extension of the Magellanic stream. The first whole sky coverage will be finished in 2011. Already this first coverage will reach the same sensitivity level as the Parkes Milky Way (GASS) and extragalactic surveys (HIPASS). EBHIS data will be calibrated, stray‐radiation corrected and freely accessible for the scientific community via a webinterface. In this paper we demonstrate the scientific data quality and explore the expected harvest of this new all‐sky survey (© 2011 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)

Context. The subsequent coalescence of low-mass halos over cosmic time is thought to be the major formation channel of massive spiral galaxies like the Milky Way and the Andromeda galaxy (M 31). The gaseous halo of a massive galaxy is considered to be the reservoir of baryonic matter persistently fueling the star formation in the disk. Because of its proximity, M 31 is the ideal object for studying the structure of the halo gas in great detail. Aims. Using the latest neutral atomic hydrogen (HI) data of the Effelsberg-Bonn HI Survey (EBHIS) allows comprising a comprehensive inventory of gas associated with M 31. The primary aim is to differentiate between physical structures belonging to the Milky Way Galaxy and M 31 and accordingly to test the presence of a M 31 neutral gaseous halo. Methods. Analyzing the spatially fully sampled EBHIS data makes it feasible to trace coherent HI structures in space and radial velocity. To disentangle Milky Way and M 31 HI emission we use a new approach, along with the traditional path of setting an upper radial velocity limit, by calculating a difference second moment map. Results. We argue that M 31's disk is physically connected to an asymmetric HI halo of tens of kpc size, the M 31 cloud. We confirm the presence of a coherent low-velocity HI filament located in between M 31 and M 33 aligned at the sky with the clouds at systemic velocity. The physical parameters of the HI filament are comparable to those of the HI clouds at systemic velocity. We also detected an irregularly shaped HI cloud that is is positionally located close to but offset from the stellar body of And XIX.

The short-spacing problem describes the inherent inability of radio-interferometric arrays to measure the integrated flux and structure of diffuse emission associated with extended sources. New interferometric arrays, such as Square Kilometer Array (SKA), require solutions to efficiently combine interferometer and single-dish data. We present a new and open-source approach for merging single-dish and cleaned interferometric datasets, requiring a minimum of data manipulation while offering a rigid flux determination and full high-angular resolution. Our approach combines single-dish and cleaned interferometric data in the image domain. This approach is tested for both galactic and extragalactic HI datasets. Furthermore, a quantitative comparison of our results with commonly used methods is provided. Additionally, for the interferometric datasets of NGC 4214 and NGC 5055, we study the impact of different imaging parameters as well as their influence on the combination for NGC 4214. The approach does not require raw data (visibilities) or any additional special information, such as antenna patterns. This is advantageous, especially in the light of upcoming radio surveys with heterogeneous antenna designs.