Observing the sky: LSST simulation

Enigma_1189

This is an animation of a potential LSST observing strategy, from simulated survey 'enigma_1189'. For more information on LSST simulated surveys, see https://confluence.lsstcorp.org/displ..., which includes a link to a set of additional simulated surveys.

More analysis of the enigma_1189 run is available at http://tusken.astro.washington.edu:80...

This movie includes nights 25-32 then skips ahead to 400-401 (just beyond the first year, just after the sky is just coming to closure), then skips to near the end of the survey for nights 3000-3001. Some nights within those are not shown, due to weather or other downtime included in the simulated survey. The left-hand side of the movie illustrates the ongoing observations; the 'active' observation is shown with a black outline, while previous observations are shown with various levels of transparency corresponding to how recent and how many there have been at each pointing in the sky. The gray circular area near the center is the 20 degree elevation pointing limit for LSST. The entire map rotates to keep "overhead" (zenith) at the center of the plot. The right hand side of the movie shows the cumulative number of visits; at the top this is the total number of visits in all bands, while the small plots show u/g, r/i, z/y bands separately. The scale for the cumulative number of visits in all bands is 0-90 for the first year of the survey, 0-180 the second year, and so on until year ten when it is 0-900; in each of the individual bands, the scale runs up to 1/4 of the max in all bands (i.e. 0-22 in the first year).