P. Padovani, October 16, 2007, VO Workshop, IUCAA, Pune - 1

Science with the Virtual Observatory

Paolo Padovani

Head, Virtual Observatory Systems Department, ESO, Garching bei München, Germany

&EURO-VO Facility Centre Scientist

• Science in the Virtual Observatory era

• Selected astronomical results with the VO

• The role of data centres and their VO-related science activities

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Science and the Virtual Observatory

The ultimate goal of the VO is to facilitate the work of astronomers and foster new science.

This is done directly by: • allowing easier/better access to (ever larger amounts of) data • providing new/improved research tools [Allen, Hatziminaoglou]

And indirectly by: • motivating data centres to:

1. agree on common standards (esp. for information exchange)2. provide homogeneous meta-data (data about data) and quality

flags3. produce and/or collect science-ready data

Indirect ways not easily linkable to the VO! (e.g., data - papers links; but also Aladin!)

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Data - Papers links

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Aladin

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A selection of VO-based astronomical papers

• List of VO-based papers at http://www.euro-vo.org/pub/fc/papers.html• Papers which make “heavy” use of VO tools and services• Lower limit to papers which are VO-related• Selected (almost randomly) recent results to show diversity of problems which

can be tackled with VO tools:• Using VO tools to investigate distant radio starburst hosting obscured AGN

in the HDF(N) region, Richards et al., A&A, 2007, 472, 805 • Albus 1: a very bright White Dwarf candidate, Caballero & Solano, ApJ,

665, L151 (2007) • Flare productivity of newly-emerged paired and isolated solar active

regions, Dalla, Fletcher, & Walton, A&A, 468, 1103 (2007)• Radio-loud Narrow-Line Type 1 Quasars, Komossa et al., AJ, 132, 531

(2006)• Luminous AGB stars in nearby galaxies. A study using VO tools,

Tsalmantza et al., A&A, 447, 89 (2006)

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VO Research Initiatives

• Call for Proposals issued Feb. 2007 by EURO-VO project, through the ESO/ESA managed Facility Centre

• Aimed to support astronomical projects driven by the VO concept and making use of VO tools and applications

• Nine proposals received, three selected by EURO-VO Science Advisory Committee (with EURO-VO technical input): 1. Dust Evolution as a tracer of Environmental Changes (Sauvage et al.)2. Quantifying visible and hidden star-formation in galaxies (Franzetti

et al.)3. Triggered massive star formation in the Galaxy (Deharveng et al.)

• Selected teams will receive scientific support and technical contact points to complete their projects by December 2007

• Similar initiative carried out by NVO (USA)

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Data Centres in the VO Era

• The VO needs data astronomical data centres lie at its foundation• VO-related/motivated work on-going at many data centres is

making astronomers’ life easier through a variety of science enhancements; e.g.,: 1. common standards, to facilitate cross-archive searches2. better archive interfaces3. meta-data collection/derivation/creation: “smart queries”4. creation, collection, and publication of highly processed and

survey data products (e.g., ESO Large Programs and Public Surveys; HST Treasury, Archival Legacy, and Large Programs; ISO Highly Processed Data Products; Spitzer Legacy Programs)

• Much of this work is hidden and/or not obviously VO-related

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Classical archive query

Archive query @ ESO30 Doradus, r = 10’:2539 entries, ~ 120 pages of output

Summary table:

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Virgo 1

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Virgo 2

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New Advanced Data Products Interface: Ultraviolet and Visual Échelle Spectrograph (UVES) pipeline data

soon: object class, redshift, etc.

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ESO Call for Proposal:“Since Period 75, the PIs of successful proposals for Large Programmes are required to provide all data products (processed images and spectra, catalogues) to the ESO archive by the time of the publication of their scientific result in a refereed publication”.

Motivations:

1. Enhance the legacy of ESO data (Large Programmes, Public Surveys) facilitating further scientific exploitation. Similar policy/efforts underway in other observatories

2. An increasing demand from the community to access high-level data products in the ESO archive

• A prompt scientific exploitation of the VO infrastructures relies heavily on the availability of large volumes of highly processed data

- Enthusiastic endorsement by Observing Programmes Committee

- Well received by PIs (visibility/citations, homogeneous, and lasting storage in the archive)

Highly Processed Data

• ESO Large Program ingestion starting now:

‣ Great Observatories Origins Deep Survey (GOODS), PI: Cesarsky (Sep 07)• ISAAC+VIMOS imaging• FORS2+VIMOS spectra

‣ zCOSMOS: The evolutionary links between galaxies, their nuclei, their morphologies and their environments, first release, PI: Lilly (Oct 07), VIMOS spectra

‣ Transiting planets and brown dwarfs in young open clusters, PI: Aigrain (Oct 07), WFI imaging

‣ GMASS: the Galaxy Mass Assembly ultra-deep Spectroscopic Survey, PI: Cimatti (Nov 07), FORS2 spectra

•Expected rate in 2008 of ≈ 10/year

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Highly Processed Data @ MAST

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Summary

• The mail goal of the Virtual Observatory is to facilitate research and foster new science

• VO-based papers are being published on a variety of astronomical topics

• Very soon a large fraction of astronomical research will be made possible also thanks to VO-related efforts on-going in data centres around the world, unbeknownst to most astronomers

• More on VO Science this week!

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VO Science: this Workshop

• Active Galactic Nuclei science (Allen)• Selected science drivers (Djorgovski)• 3C 295 (Guainazzi)• IMF of massive stars (Hatziminaoglou)• Search for new quasars (Kembhavi)

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Large Surveys

• Astronomers are securing a huge amount of data overall. But technological developments imply also that larger and larger areas of the sky can be studied homogenously to deeper and deeper fluxes large surveys

• A multi-wavelength selection includes: NVSS, FIRST, WENSS (radio); IRAS, 2MASS, DENIS (IR);

SDSS [Sinha], 2dF (optical); GALEX (UV); ROSAT, XMM (X-ray); EGRET (gamma-ray) [Kembhavi]

• Large surveys deliver huge, homogeneous data sets: ideal for exploitation even by “non experts”, as most of the work has been done by the survey teams

• Some of them include more than 100 million sources• VO facilitates access and cross-survey utilization

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Optical Near IR

QUEST

SDSS

CFH-L

LSST

DLS

NWDS

GOODS

BTC

CFH-L NWDS

UDFHDF

VST

PS4

Large Surveys

T. Tyson, 2006, IAU GA XXVI, Special Session 3

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High-level VO Work on the ESO Archive

1. Build a “VO layer”2. Improve archive interface3. Creation of highly processed (“science-ready”) data: very

important for VO users 4. Collection, validation, and publishing into archive (according

to detailed guidelines) of highly processed community data [paradigm change]

5. Same from Large Programs and upcoming Public Surveys (VST & Vista) [now required]