{
  "abstract": "In this paper we present synthetic Very Long Baseline Interferometry (VLBI) observations of M87 between a near-future configuration of the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) and one or multiple 2.5 m-class balloon-borne VLBI stations on a northern transatlantic flight trajectory launching from Kiruna, Sweden. These balloon-borne VLBI stations have the advantage of operating above 99.5% of the atmosphere and their motion allows for efficient sampling of the uv-plane. Assuming frequency phase transfer between 230 and 86 GHz we run these simulations using a modified version of the ngehtsim software package. Our simulations demonstrate the ability of such a VLBI array to probe M87 at the jet base adding baselines down to 0.2 G$λ$ for a single balloon-VLBI station and 0.07 G$λ$ for three balloon VLBI stations. Using the Bayesian imaging software Comrade.jl, we demonstrate the recovery of jet structures up to 150 $μ$as in size for a single balloon and up to 300 $μ$as in size with three balloons. Finally, we test the improvement in jet image fidelity by computing the normalized cross-correlation (NXCOR) and normalized-root-mean-square error (NRMSE) between the image reconstruction and ground truth. We find a factor of 1.2 improvement in the jet NRMSE for a single balloon and a factor of 1.3 improvement for 3 balloons as compared to EHT-only simulations.",
  "abstract_shown": true,
  "affiliations": [],
  "article_type": null,
  "arxiv": "2610.19204",
  "author_total": 5,
  "authors": [
    {
      "name": "Felix M. Thiel"
    },
    {
      "name": "Dominic W. Pesce"
    },
    {
      "name": "Mayukh Bagchi"
    },
    {
      "name": "Laura M. Fissel"
    },
    {
      "name": "Lindy Blackburn"
    }
  ],
  "bibtex": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/4b2q28dbt71rd.bib",
  "cited_by": 0,
  "doi": "10.48550/arxiv.2610.19204",
  "fulltext_url": null,
  "id": "4b2q28dbt71rd",
  "issns": [],
  "landing_url": "https://arxiv.org/abs/2610.19204",
  "language": null,
  "licence": "LicenseRef-arXiv-nonexclusive-1.0",
  "licence_label": "arXiv licence",
  "licence_source": "article",
  "licence_url": "http://arxiv.org/licenses/nonexclusive-distrib/1.0/",
  "metadata_licence": "CC0-1.0",
  "native_subjects": [
    [
      "arxiv",
      "astro-ph.IM"
    ],
    [
      "openalex",
      "3103|Astrophysical Phenomena and Observations"
    ]
  ],
  "openalex": "W7222036973",
  "pdf_url": "https://arxiv.org/pdf/2610.19204",
  "pmcid": null,
  "pmid": null,
  "published": "2026-10-13",
  "publisher": null,
  "ris": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/4b2q28dbt71rd.ris",
  "sources": [
    {
      "first_seen": "2026-10-30T12:29:31Z",
      "native_id": "2610.19204",
      "source": "arxiv",
      "url": "https://arxiv.org/abs/2610.19204"
    }
  ],
  "subjects": [
    {
      "field": "astronomy",
      "origin": "arxiv:astro-ph.IM",
      "subfield": "instrumentation-methods"
    }
  ],
  "title": "Studying the Near-horizon Jet of M87 using Millimeter Balloon-borne VLBI stations",
  "title_text": "Studying the Near-horizon Jet of M87 using Millimeter Balloon-borne VLBI stations",
  "type": "preprint",
  "updated_at": "2026-10-30T12:29:31Z",
  "url": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/4b2q28dbt71rd",
  "venue": "arXiv",
  "versions": []
}