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 ms pulsars is being observed at three radio-frequency bands, 50 cm (ß700 MHz), 20 cm (ß1400 MHz), and 10 cm (ß3100 MHz), with observations at intervals of two to three 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 10 of the 20 pulsars, rms timing residuals are less than 1 μs 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 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.

A large sample of pulsars was observed as part of the Meterwavelength Single-pulse Polarimetric Emission Survey. We carried out a detailed fluctuation spectral analysis which revealed periodic features in 46% pulsars including 22 pulsars where drifting characteristics were reported for the first time. The pulsar population can be categorized into three distinct groups, pulsars which show systematic drift motion within the pulse window, the pulsars showing no systematic drift but periodic amplitude fluctuation and pulsars with no periodic variations. We discovered the dependence of the drifting phenomenon on the spin down energy loss (Ė), with the three categories occupying distinctly different regions along theĖ axis. The estimation of the drift periodicity (P 3 ) from the peak frequency in the fluctuation spectra is ambiguous due to the aliasing effect. However, using basic physical arguments we were able to determine P 3 in pulsars showing systematic drift motion. The estimated P 3 values in these pulsars were anti-correlated withĖ which favoured the Partially Screened Gap model of Inner Acceleration Region in pulsars.

We have conducted the Meterwavelength Single-pulse Polarimetric Emission Survey to study the radio emission properties of normal pulsars. A total of 123 pulsars with periods between 0.1 seconds and 8.5 seconds were observed in the survey at two different frequencies, 105 profiles at 333 MHz, 118 profiles at 618 MHz and 100 pulsars at both. In this work we concentrate primarily on the time-averaged properties of the pulsar emission. The measured widths of the pulsar profiles in our sample usually exhibit the radius to frequency mapping. We validate the existence of lower bounds for the distribution of profile widths with pulsar period (P ), which is seen for multiple definitions of the width, viz. a lower boundary line (LBL) at 2.7 • P −0.5 with width measured at 50% level of profile peak, a LBL at 5.7 • P −0.5 for 10% level of peak and LBL at 6.3 • P −0.5 for width defined as 5σ above the baseline level. In addition we have measured the degree of linear polarization in the average profile of pulsars and confirmed their dependence on pulsar spindown energy loss (Ė). The single pulse polarization data show interesting trends with the polarization position angle (PPA) distribution exhibiting the simple rotating vector model for highĖ pulsars while the PPA becomes more complex for medium and lowĖ pulsars. The single pulse total intensity data is useful for studying a number of emission properties from pulsars like subpulse drifting, nulling and mode changing which is being explored in separate works.