Tools for Data-Intensive Astronomy
a VO Community Day at the Steward Observatory/University of Arizona

Tuesday March 13, 2012
9:00AM - 11:50AM
Location: Steward Observatory Lecture Hall (N210) - University of Arizona.

The Virtual Observatory (VO) is realizing global electronic integration of astronomy data, tools, and services for use by individuals around the world. This new environment of interoperability will facilitate astronomy research with a speed, efficiency, and effectiveness not previously possible, and it will be available to all researchers, independent of their affiliation or access to observing facilities.

During this “VO Day”, aimed at research astronomers, VO experts from the Virtual Astronomical Observatory (VAO) - one of many VO projects worldwide - will demonstrate new tools and services for data-intensive astronomy in the context of a range of science use cases and tutorials. These use cases and tutorials, based on recent results from the literature and on-going missions, will include:

* constructing and modeling spectral energy distributions
* cross-matching objects from diverse catalogs
* exploration of time series data
* image analysis tools
* advanced discovery tools for images, tables, and literature.

This workshop is organized and sponsored by the US Virtual Astronomical Observatory. The workshop is open to anyone interested, and there is no registration fee. Registration, however, is required. Please visit

http://www.usvao.org/voday@tucson

for registration and further information, including maps & directions.

There is also a printable poster for this workshop: http://www.usvao.org/voday@tucson/VODay@Tucson.pdf. We would be grateful if you would print and post it in your department. Thank you, and hope to see you on March 13.

If you have any questions, please contact:

Betty Stobie
bstobie@noao.edu
(520) 318-8390

A special session on Data Intensive Astronomy will be held during the General Assembly of the International Astronomical Union in Beijing (August 2012).  Participants are invited to register and submit abstract(s) through the IAU XXVIII General Assembly web site.

Session Description: The rapid development of semiconductor technology has lead to large sensitive detectors that enabled astronomers to easily survey large sky areas. Such large-scale observations and surveys cover a wide range of scientific themes in astronomy. Astronomers need to be well-prepared for such a new era of astronomical research utilizing large amounts of data. Since the data production rate will be 100 to 1000 times larger than the past, advanced data analyses combined with statistics and data mining will be essential to derive general “rules” and/or “knowledge” on various phenomena in the Universe, as the data volumes will make human inspection and analysis of the data impossible. The most important and exciting astronomical discoveries of the coming decade will rely on research and development in data science disciplines that enable rapid information extraction, knowledge discovery, and others, combined with sophisticated data management, access, visualization and other technical advancement.

Topics include:

• Near- and far-future telescopes and survey projects that will produce large-scale data
• Scientific insights from large-scale observations in broad fields in astronomy
• Advanced data analyses, such as data mining, in deriving scientific knowledge from large-scale data
• Data management and data access with and beyond virtual observatories to ensure data-intensive astronomical research
• Synergy of data-intensive astronomy with other fields, such as mathematics/statistics and informatics
• Education, Public Outreach and Others

More information about Special Session 15 : Data Intensive Astronomy can be found at http://www.adc.nao.ac.jp/SpS15/

The US Virtual Astronomical Observatory (VAO) seeks proposals from the astronomical research community for science collaborations that utilize virtual observatory capabilities or develop novel virtual observatory tools to produce new re-search results.  Proposals may be in any area of astronomy, but projects that benefit from the integration of data in multiple wavelength regions, that involve analysis of time-domain data sets, and/or utilize large databases or data sets are the most germane to the VAO. The VAO cannot directly fund these collaborations, but will provide in-kind support in using and adapting VO technologies in the selected projects.  Such support may include VAO technical staff visiting a research team or covering travel costs for members of a research team to visit a VAO organization.  Ongoing support will be in the form of telecons, e-meetings (e.g. WebEx), a Wiki site, or other online collaborative tools.

If you have a research project or research tool that you think would benefit from easy access to the diverse data archives, catalogs, and databases that are available through the virtual observatory, we would like to hear from you!  We ask that you submit a brief proposal (2-3 pages) describing the project you have in mind and indicating what level of effort you are able to devote to the project.  The VAO Science Council will assist the VAO project in selecting those proposals that are the most complementary to the goals of the VAO and having the highest likelihood of success, either in terms of new science results or new products (advanced data products, software tools) of benefit to the astronomical community.

Please submit proposals to director@usvao.org by 1 March 2012. Results will be communicated by e-mail to all applicants by 1 May 2012.

Authors: F. M. Jiménez-Esteban, J. A. Caballero, R. Dorda, P. A. Miles-Páez, E. Solano

Accepted in Astronomy & Astrophysics
http://arxiv.org/abs/1201.5315

Abstract: Aims: With available Virtual Observatory tools, we looked for new M dwarfs in the solar neighbourhood and M giants with high tangential velocities. Methods: From an all-sky cross-match between the optical Tycho-2 and the near-infrared 2MASS catalogues, we selected objects with proper motions >50mas/yr and very red V-Ks colours. For the most interesting targets, we collected multi-wavelength photometry, constructed spectral energy distributions, estimated effective temperatures and surface gravities from fits to atmospheric models, performed time-series analysis of ASAS V-band light curves, and assigned spectral types from low-resolution spectroscopy obtained with CAFOS at the 2.2m Calar Alto telescope. Results: We got a sample of 59 bright red high proper-motion objects, including fifty red giants, four red dwarfs, and five objects reported in this work for the first time. The five new stars have magnitudes V~10.8-11.3mag, reduced proper motions midway between known dwarfs and giants, near-infrared colours typical of giants, and effective temperatures Teff~2900-3400K. From our time-series analysis, we discovered a long secondary period in Ruber 4 and an extremely long primary period in Ruber 6. With the CAFOS spectra, we confirmed the red giant nature of Ruber 7 and 8, the last of which seems to be one of the brightest metal-poor M giants ever identified.

Read more at http://www.datanami.com/datanami/2012-01-23/the_new_era_of_computing:_an_interview_with_dr._data.html

Try it now at http://www.usvao.org/tools

Feedback on your experience with the tool is appreciated. Send your comments, suggestions, and questions to the VAO Help Desk.

Try it now at http://www.usvao.org/tools

Feedback on your experience with the tool is appreciated. Send your comments, suggestions, and questions to the VAO Help Desk.

Try it now at http://www.usvao.org/tools

Feedback on your experience with the tool is appreciated. Send your comments, suggestions, and questions to the VAO Help Desk.

On Sunday, January 8, from 12-5PM in Room 19A in the Austin Convention Center, there will be a workshop entitled “Science Tools for Data-Intensive Astronomy”. This workshop will be focused on the science tools for data discovery, visualization, and analysis. The workshop is structured in the form of two independent sessions and is designed to demonstrate the emerging set of tools and services for data-intensive astronomy.

• Session 1 (12-2PM) is aimed at educators.
• Session 2 (2:30-5PM) is aimed at research astronomers.

There is also a special session of interest on Monday, January 9, from 10-11:30AM in Room 18D. The goal of the session, “Cyber-Discovery and Science for the Decade“, is to highlight the science that is driving large surveys and instruments with high data rates, and how meaning can be extracted from the resulting large data sets. The session seeks to illustrate the sense of Cyber-Discovery that will become possible in this decade, as discussed in the New Worlds, New Horizons Decadal Survey. The structure of the session will be as a series of invited talks, with topics including time domain surveys, testing fundamental physics via radio pulsar observations, cosmological simulations, and machine learning techniques that could apply for astronomical data processing. Speakers will discuss not only the science, but illustrate how the science pushes the envelope in some aspect or aspects of “big data.”

With extreme sadness we note the passing of Dave De Young, the NVO Project Scientist, and until this past summer the VAO Project Scientist.  Dave always kept science foremost in the virtual observatory project, and served as a wise and trusted advisor to NVO, VAO, and the International Virtual Observatory Alliance.

Dave was our colleague and our friend.  We will miss you very very much.

The post on the VAO Facebook page is open for comments. Please share your thoughts and memories of Dave there, if you wish.

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