Creating Data that Never Die:
Building a Spectrograph Data Pipeline in the Virtual Observatory Era
By
Douglas J. Mink, William F. Wyatt, John B. Roll, Susan P. Tokarz,
Maureen A. Conroy, Nelson Caldwell, Michael J. Kurtz, Margaret J. Geller
Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, Cambridge, MA 02138
Data pipelines for modern complex astronomical instruments do not begin
when the data is taken and end when it is delivered to the user. Information
must flow between the observatory and the observer from the time a project
is conceived and between the observatory and the world well past the time
when the original observers have extracted all the information they want
from the data. For the 300-fiber Hectospec low dispersion spectrograph
on the MMT, the SAO Telescope Data Center is constructing a data pipeline
which provides assistance from preparing and submitting observing proposals
through observation, reduction, and analysis to publication and an afterlife
in the Virtual Observatory. We will describe our semi-automatic pipeline and
how it has evolved over the first nine months of operation.
Reference:
Mink, D.J., Wyatt, W.F., Roll, J.B., Tokarz, S.P., Conroy, M.A., Caldwell,
N., Kurtz, M.J., Geller, M.J., 2005, in Astronomical Data Analysis Software
and Systems XIV, ASP Conference Series, Vol. 347, Edited by P.L. Shopbell,
M.C. Britton, and R. Ebert, San Francisco: Astronomical Society of the
Pacific, 2005, p.228.