CASB Report May, 2001

Highlights for Division Meeting

· Delivered the GSC 2.2 Export Catalog to Gemini North and South and to ESO VLT.

· Improved and expanded the CASB web site for this release and opened it to the public.

· Prepared release notes and video presentation to support announcement of GSC 2.2 at the June AAS Meeting in Pasadena.

Community Affairs and Communications

· McLean is attending the June AAS Meeting to announce the release of GSC 2.2

· Asbury is attending the June AAS meeting to promote the Bright Object Tool and The Visual Target Tuner.

Project Management and Technical Infrastructure

· McLean and Greene continued supporting SDSS implementation activities.

· Greene continued supporting Independent Detector Testing Lab (IDTL) activities.

MISSION SUPPORT

HST Operations

· Reviewed four Guide Star Problem Reports (GSPRs) this period. Two GSPRs were fine lock failures. The other two were search failures due to pairs misclassified as single stars in GSC-I. Filed a Bad GS Alert for each of the GSs.

· With Jesse Doggett, planning the next release of the Bright Object Tool in Mid-June. This version will tie into the newly released GSC 2.2.

· Noted that the recent STUC meeting recommended that the 2MASS images be incorporated into the APT tool in the same manner as the DSS – started discussions with IPAC to look into this possibility.

NGST Development

· Final Guide Star study report STScI-NGST-R-0013B formally delivered by Spagna to NGST division office. – Noted a major recommendation that the 2MASS catalog be incorporated into the GSC-II for NGST operations.

DIGITIZED SKY SURVEY

Plate Scanning

· Resumed scanning UKST-IR plates on GAMMA1 after it was put back into production in mid-May.

GAMMA Microdensitometer Systems

· Performed mechanical maintenance on GAMMA1. Judged the performance to be nominal and the scanner was returned to production.

· GAMMA2 remains out of production due to a problem that is causing a feedback to the X-servo causing very unstable table motion.

Data Compression/CD Production

· Continued compressing scans of the POSSII-N survey.

· Started compressing scans of the AAO Short-Red survey.

Archive Maintenance

· Worked on three archive help desk requests for help/information.

· Continued low-level rationalization of MOD archive.

GSC-II

Plate Processing and COMPASS Database

· Delivered the magnitude-selected GSC 2.2 Export Catalog to Gemini North and South and to ESO VLT. The Export Catalog contains 435,457,355 objects (as compiled shortly before delivery).

· Prepared for release of GSC 2.2 at June AAS Meeting:

• Prepared 3 PowerPoint slides for inclusion in the STScI video presentation to be run at the meeting;
• Prepared a two-sided color handout for duplication and distribution;
• Provided overlays from GSC1 and GSC2.2 onto a field from the Rosette Nebula for inclusion in the photomontage for the GSC2.2 press release.

· Completed large portions of the new CASB web site unveiled at the end of May, including checking over the entire site for consistencies of “look&feel”

· QA work continues on the GSC2.2 database and the associated export catalog. The very large size of the dataset (nearly 2 terabytes in size with a billion database entries in 32768 files!) has made quality assessment time consuming and analysis problematic, but significant progress has been made.

· Generated meaningful statistics resulting in a subset of the data being repaired. Also made significant progress on the remaining southern problem fields. Finally tracked down and fixed a subtle memory problem in the plate matching code. Only two plates (containing over 8 million detections each!) remain unmatched due to another unrelated memory problem.

· Ran a version of the export task without the magnitude limits and with some other minor modifications. This uncut version has completed with only 1 missing database region (plus the 2 missing fields). Generating statistics on this version of the catalog. The uncut version will contain nearly all the billion catalog entries and be on the order of 90 GB in size.

· Continued processing POSSII-N and UKST-IR plates.

CALIBRATIONS: General

· Attempted to perform matching of external catalogs against the exported GSC2.2 with the modified GSC22Query code, to repeat and extend the comparisons and quality assurance of the catalog that was performed on the GSC2.1 data. This work could not be completed, however, due to unpredictable and unrepeatable failures of the query when run in batch mode over thousands of catalog objects. No such problems were encountered when matching against the GSC2.1. These critical investigations are on hold until the problem can be either solved or worked around. (A partial workaround is in progress at OATo using the GSC2.1 query code to query the GSC2.2. However this does not return all data necessary for quality assurance of the catalog.)

CALIBRATIONS: Astrometry

· Continued a study on a magnitude dependent systematic error in the GSC 2.2 positions. This study compares the position in the GSC 2.2 (GSC 2.1) with those in the SPM, NPM, USNO A and 2MASS catalogs.

CALIBRATIONS: Classification

· Modified the OC1 decision tree program to use the data in a FITS-formatted training set file to produce the correct auxiliary tables for the FITS-formatted decision tree files. Added columns to the FITS output file to include minimum and maximum values of the parameters for the training set objects at each node.

· Wrote a small utility program to combine several FITS decision trees into a single FITS file.

· Modified VERCLASS, the versatile classification task presently in development, to read the additional minima and maxima described above

CALIBRATIONS: Photometry (GSPC-II and DSS-I and -II)

· Jane Morrison observed seven nights at La Palma (May 26 – Jun 01)

· Brian McLean observed six nights at La Palma (Apr 27 – May 02)

· Next run June 26-Jul 04

GSC-II Science

· F. Guglielmetti continued production of a new Planetary Nebula catalog with improved coordinates from GSC2.1.

Appendix – CASB Statistical Summary

SCANNING

Survey		Goal	Previous Month	Current Month	Current Total	% done	Notes	Priority
POSS-II J	897		902	0	902	100	S4	1
POSS-II F	897		910	0	910	100	S4	1
POSS-II N	897		880	0	880	98	S4	1
AAO-SES	606		614	0	614	100	S4	1
PPARC-ER	288		288	0	288	100		1
AAO-SR	118		118	0	118	100	S2	-
UKST-SR	112		50	0	50	45	S5	3
UKST-IR	894		658	16	674	75		2
SERC-J/EJ	447		443	0	443	99	S1	2
POSS-I E	106		106	0	106	100	S3	3
POSS-I O	936		301	6	307	33		3
Rescans			34	0	34

• S1. Low priority program to rescan crowded fields (|b|<30) originally done with 25 mu scans. The total number of S scans includes the 2 for the LMC and SMC plus 4 others with |b|>30 performed for research or STIS BOP support. Another 30 plates have been added to replace those that were repaired before inclusion in DSS-I.
• S2. This survey is an on-going low level-of-effort collaboration between the STScI and the AAO. About 25-50 plates have been added in each of the past few years.
• S3. Low priority scans of the POSS-I -24 deg and -30 deg zones.
• S4. Includes recent scans of better grade plates.
• S5. Low priority scans of the moderately short exposure R plates from the SERC I/SR Atlas of the Milky Way.

COMPRESSION

Survey	Goal	Previous Month	Current Month	Current Total	% done	Notes	Priority
POSS-II J	897	895	0	897	100		2
POSS-II F	897	897	0	897	100		1
POSS-II N	897	577	40	617	69		3
AAO SES	606	606	0	606	100		1
PPARC ER	288	288	0	288	100		1
AAO-SR	118	0	90	90	76		3
UKST-IR	894	658	0	658	74		3

MO DISK ARCHIVING

Survey	Goal	Previous Month	Current Month	Current Total	% done	Notes	Priority
POSS-II J	897	902	0	902	100		4
POSS-II F	897	900	0	900	100		3
POSS-II N	897	823	0	823	92		4
AAO-SES	606	613	0	613	100		3
PPARC-ER	288	288	0	288	100		3
AAO-SR	109	73	43	116	100		4
UKST-IR	894	658	0	658	74		5
SERC-J/EJ	894	892	0	892	100
SERC-J/REPAIR	48	48	0	48	100
SERC-J/15mu	449	449	0	449	100		5
POSS-I E	933	928	0	928	99		2
POSS-I REPAIR	198	198	0	198	100		2
POSS-QV	613	613	0	613	100		-
SERC-QV	94	94	0	94	100		-
GPO/BB	88	88	0	88	100		-

GSC-II PLATE PROCESSING

Survey	Goal	Previous Month	Current Month	Current Total	% done	Notes	Priority
POSS-I E	936	931	0	931	99		3
POSS-QV	613	2	0	2	0		3
POSS-II J	897	897	0	897	100		1
POSS-II F	897	897	0	897	100		1
POSS-II N	897	82	49	131	15		4
SERC-J/EJ	894	829	0	829	93		1
South-F	894	894	0	894	100		1
UKST-IR	894	15	57	72	8		4
South-SR	116	116	0	116	100		2
South-QV	94	94	0	94	100		2

GSC-II COMPASS DATABASE LOAD (no.objects = 998,402,801)

Survey	Goal	Previous Month	Current Month	Current Total	% done	Notes	Priority
POSS-I E	936	23	0	23	2		3
POSS-QV	613	2	0	2	0		3
POSS-II J	897	897	0	897	100		1
POSS-II F	897	899	0	899	100		1
POSS-II N	897	27	0	27	3		4
SERC-J	894	709	0	709	79		1
South-F	894	742	0	742	83		1
UKST-IR	894	2	0	2	0		4
South-SR	116	116	0	116	100		2
South-QV	94	90	0	90	96		2

GSC-II Dataset for V2.2.n delivery (1791 Fields, 3438 plates) (P1)

Item	Count	% done	Notes
Plates available	3438	100
Plates processed	3438	100
DB Load	3438	100

• P1. Defined as all 897 POSS-II fields with 1794 plates, plus the 894 southern

Fields, minus the 72 southern equatorial fields, with 1644 plates.

GSPC-II OBSERVATIONS

Survey	Goal	Previous Month	Current Month	Current Total	% done	Notes	Priority
POSS-I	584	561	13	574	98	P1	1
POSS-II	314	171	14	185	59		1
SERC	894	884	0	884	99		1

GSPC-II REDUCTIONS

Survey	Goal	Previous Month	Current Month	Current Total	% done	Notes	Priority
POSS-I	584	563	0	563	96	P1	1
POSS-II	314	175	0	175	56		1
SERC	894	901	0	901	100		1

• P1. The current totals have been revised from earlier ones.