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LSST E-News

LSST E-News

April 2013  •  Volume 6 Number 1

Science Collaboration Chairs Meeting

Meeting of the LSST Science Collaboration Chairs, March 15 & 16th, 2013, in Tucson, AZ. Front Row (L-R): K. Covey, K. Borne, M. Wood-Vasey, K. Olsen, B. Willman, A. Mahabal, S. Wolff, T. Lauer. Remaining Row(s) (L-R): M. Dickinson, R. Seaman, M. Juric, R. Kessler, C. Schafer, D. Bard, M. Strauss, P. Marshall (on iPad), X. Fan, Z. Ivezic, S. Nissanke, G. Dubois-Felsmann, T. Tyson, C. Claver, S. Kahn, E. Gawiser, H. Ferguson, L. Walkowicz, D. Shaw, A. Abate, T. Matheson. Image credit: LSSTC

More than 40 members of LSST science collaborations met in Tucson March 14 & 15, 2013, at a meeting hosted jointly by NOAO and LSST. The purpose of the meeting was to discuss the next steps for the science collaborations as the project prepares to transition to construction and to define the relationship between the science collaborations and the LSST Project going forward.

The construction project, as defined in the proposal submitted to NSF, is focused on building the LSST facilities and data management system. Leadership for using LSST data to do science must come from the science community. This meeting of the science collaboration chairs was the first step toward enabling this activity, bringing together the relevant community of scientists.

Since their inception in 2005, the science collaborations have been largely focused on what they can do for the Project. Contributions from science collaborations, in particular the 2009 LSST Science Book, have provided invaluable input in defining the science requirements to the Project. Going forward, there will be an increasing focus on how scientists can prepare themselves to do science when LSST data begin to flow (and beforehand, with precursor data).

LSST Project Scientist for Data Management Mario Juric led a discussion on the software effort, describing the three Levels of processing that will be done on the data.

  • Level 1 (nightly processing) will issue alerts of transients and variables. The alert will characterize each transient, i.e., it will describe the observed properties. It will not attempt to classify the object, i.e., determine the nature of the source. Groups interested in following up on alerts will likely want to establish an “event broker” to sort through the large number of events observed each night to select ones of interest to particular science projects.
  • Level 2 (annual data releases) will aim to allow most science to be done at the catalog level. A detailed document is being prepared describing the outputs. The algorithms and outputs will at a minimum be at the level of SDSS, although we anticipate significantly more sophistication in things like galaxy shape measurements. The Level 2 processing will include artificial sources introduced into the data stream.
  • Level 3 data products will be developed by the science community. Computing resources provided within the project for community use in developing Level 3 products will be limited to about 10% of the overall processing power of the project. National supercomputer centers can provide additional computing resources. For example, the NCSA is designing its next-generation machine and is interested in projects the science collaborations would like to do with this resource in 2015-2020 (i.e., during LSST construction in preparation for the start of the survey).

NOAO Scientist Steve Ridgway led a discussion of the LSST Observing Cadence. Scientists were particularly interested in observing sequences with faster cadence on a smaller area of sky at a time, as opposed to focusing on covering the largest solid angle each night.

There is also interest in writing roadmaps for the activities of the science collaborations:

  • To organize and map out the activities of those collaborations;
  • To identify technical needs common to two or more of the collaborations;
  • To help make the case for funding of science activities in preparation for the start of the survey.

It is challenging to find ways of providing ongoing support to the science community as they prepare to use LSST data. Such support cannot be covered by the NSF MREFC request. Discussion at the Science Collaboration Chairs meeting identified several high priority items that would be of immediate benefit, including making the Operations Simulations user-friendly to explore cadence issues, distributing the reprocessed SDSS Stripe 82 data with user-friendly documentation, and developing an Event Broker to handle LSST alerts. LSSTC will be working with its member institutions, including especially NOAO and SLAC, to identify ways to support community preparations for LSST.

Next steps include leveraging the communication opportunities this meeting established; developing roadmaps for each science collaboration; identifying software tools needed by multiple collaborations, including informatics tools for mining catalogs and images; exploring plans for an Event Broker for LSST alerts; and the continuation of development and distribution of a strawman commissioning plan to inspire community comment.

Article written by S. Jacoby, M. Strauss, S. Wolff

 

LSST is a public-private partnership. Funding for design and development activity comes from the National Science Foundation, private donations, grants to universities, and in-kind support at Department of Energy laboratories and other LSSTC Institutional Members:

Adler Planetarium; Argonne National Laboratory; Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL); California Institute of Technology; Carnegie Mellon University; Chile; Cornell University; Drexel University; Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory; George Mason University; Google, Inc.; Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics; Institut de Physique Nucleaire et de Physique des Particules (IN2P3); Johns Hopkins University; Kavli Institute for Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology (KIPAC) – Stanford University; Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope Network, Inc.; Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL); Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL); National Optical Astronomy Observatory; National Radio Astronomy Observatory; Princeton University; Purdue University; Research Corporation for Science Advancement; Rutgers University; SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory; Space Telescope Science Institute; Texas A & M University; The Institute of Physics of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic; The Pennsylvania State University; The University of Arizona; University of California at Davis; University of California at Irvine; University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; University of Michigan; University of Pennsylvania; University of Pittsburgh; University of Washington; Vanderbilt and Fisk Universities

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