High angular resolution images of extragalactic radio sources are being made with the Highly Advanced Laboratory for Communications and Astronomy (HALCA) satellite and ground-based radio telescopes as part of the Very Long Baseline Interferometry (VLBI) Space Observatory Programme (VSOP). VSOP observations at 1.6 and 5 gigahertz of the milli–arc-second–scale structure of radio quasars enable the quasar core size and the corresponding brightness temperature to be determined, and they enable the motions of jet components that are close to the core to be studied. Here, VSOP images of the gamma-ray source 1156+295, the quasar 1548+056, the ultraluminous quasar 0014+813, and the superluminal quasar 0212+735 are presented and discussed.

Abstract. We present VLBI and MERLIN data at 1.66 and 4.99 GHz on the central component coincident with the nucleus of the giant radio galaxy, 3C 236. The nuclear radio structure is composed of two complexes of emission which are resolved on scales from 1 milli-arcsec (mas) to 1 arcsec. Oscillations with an amplitude of ∼5• can be seen in the compact radio structure. Spectral index distributions are plotted at angular resolutions of 10 and 25 mas and allow us to identify the core component in the south-east emission complex. Re-examination of the HST WFPC-2 image of 3C 236 by de Koff et al. (2000), shows that the normal to the dust disk in the nucleus is ∼30• from the plane of the sky and within 12• of parallel to the overall orientation of the radio source. We suggest that the radio axis is also at an angle of ∼30• to the plane of the sky and that the north-west jet is on the approaching side. This orientation implies an overall size of 4.5 Mpc (H0 = 75 km s −1 Mpc −1 , q0 = 0.5) for 3C 236. The coincidence of a dust feature and the south-east compact jet, within the astrometric errors, leads us to suggest that the dust may be in the form of a cloud encountered by the jet in the first ∼400 pc of its journey out from the nucleus. One-sided emission at 5 GHz on 1 mas scales would suggest that the jets are ejected initially at ≤ 35• to the line of sight, but this is difficult to reconcile with the obvious orientation stability of the jet system as a whole. Free-free absorption of the counter-jet may be an alternative explanation for the one-sideness. At the resolution of WSRT data at 327 MHz, the jet to the south-east is apparently continuous over a distance of 2.5 Mpc, making this the largest jet known in the universe. It is likely, however, that activity in the nucleus of 3C 236 is episodic but with a shorter duty cycle than in the double-double sources studied by Schoenmakers et al. (2000) and Kaiser et al. (2000).

Abstract. Compact Steep Spectrum (CSS) sources are known to show strong optical line emission (Gelderman & Whittle 1994) which is generally considered to be due to the interaction between the radio jet and the ISM. This argument is strengthened by the HST observations of Axon et al. (2000) which show this emission is frequently associated with the radio jet. Previous observations of the CSS quasar 3C 138 (Cotton et al. 1997) have shown that the bulk of the jet has very low amounts of Faraday rotation whereas the inner jet shows very high Faraday rotation (≈−5000 rad m −2 ). The inner jet is dominated by moving components which allows observing the fine scale of the Faraday screen as the components move behind it. We report the results of such a monitoring campaign which indicated that there is structure in the Faraday screen on the pc and possibly sub pc scale. Motions of the polarized component slowed dramatically during the course of these observations, limiting the region probed. The observations also strongly suggest that the polarized emission from the inner jet is seen through limited holes in a dense Faraday screen. In this case, the observed variations in Faraday rotation are possibly the result of jet-ISM interactions.

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