Upgraded antennas for pulsar observations in the Argentine Institute of
  Radio astronomy
  The Argentine Institute of Radio astronomy (IAR) is equipped with two
single-dish 30mts radio antennas capable of performing daily observations of
pulsars and radio transients in the southern hemisphere at 1.4 GHz. We aim to
introduce to the international community the upgrades performed and to show
that IAR observatory has become suitable for investigations in numerous areas
of pulsar radio astronomy, such as pulsar timing arrays, targeted searches of
continuous gravitational waves sources, monitoring of magnetars and glitching
pulsars, and studies of short time scale interstellar scintillation. We
refurbished the two antennas at IAR to achieve high-quality timing
observations. We gathered more than $1\,000$ hours of observations with both
antennas to study the timing precision and sensitivity they can achieve. We
introduce the new developments for both radio telescopes at IAR. We present
observations of the millisecond pulsar J0437$-$4715 with timing precision
better than 1~$\mu$s. We also present a follow-up of the reactivation of the
magnetar XTE J1810--197 and the measurement and monitoring of the latest (Feb.
1st. 2019) glitch of the Vela pulsar (J0835--4510). We show that IAR is capable
of performing pulsar monitoring in the 1.4 GHz radio band for long periods of
time with a daily cadence. This opens the possibility of pursuing several goals
in pulsar science, including coordinated multi-wavelength observations with
other observatories. In particular, observations of the millisecond pulsar
J0437$-$4715 will increase the gravitational wave sensitivity of the NANOGrav
array in their current blind spot. We also show IAR's great potential for
studying targets of opportunity and transient phenomena such as magnetars,
glitches, and fast-radio-burst sources.
