Towards 21-cm intensity mapping at z = 2.28 with uGMRT using the tapered gridded estimator – IV. Wide-band analysis

ABSTRACT We present a Wide-band tapered gridded estimator (TGE), which incorporates baseline migration and variation of the primary beam pattern for neutral hydrogen ($H\, {\small I}$) 21-cm intensity mapping (IM) with large frequency bandwidth radio-interferometric observations. Here we have analysed $394-494 \, {\rm MHz}$ (z = 1.9–2.6) uGMRT data to estimate the Multifrequency Angular Power Spectrum (MAPS) Cℓ(Δν) from which we have removed the foregrounds using the polynomial fitting (PF) and Gaussian Process Regression (GPR) methods developed in our earlier work. Using the residual Cℓ(Δν) to estimate the mean-squared 21-cm brightness temperature fluctuation Δ2(k), we find that this is consistent with 0 ± 2σ in several k bins. The resulting 2σ upper limit $\Delta ^2(k) \lt (4.68)^2 \, \rm {mK^2}$ at $k=0.219\, \rm {Mpc^{-1}}$ is nearly 15 times tighter than earlier limits obtained from a smaller bandwidth ($24.4 \, {\rm MHz}$) of the same data. The 2σ upper limit $[\Omega _{H\, {\small I}} b_{H\, {\small I}}] \lt 1.01 \times 10^{-2}$ is within an order of magnitude of the value expected from independent estimates of the $H\, {\small I}$ mass density $\Omega _{H\, {\small I}}$ and the $H\, {\small I}$ bias $b_{H\, {\small I}}$. The techniques used here can be applied to other telescopes and frequencies, including $\sim 150 \, {\rm MHz}$ Epoch of Reionization observations.