Minutes for Telecon for April 23, 2002

Present: Churchwell, Watson, Meade, Stolovy, Dickey, 
Indebetouw, Babler, Kobulnicky, Wolff, Benjamin, Clemens, Marston

Next telecon: Tuesday May 07, 2002, 11 am CDT, 608-265-1000 #4112


Robert Brunner is here this week.  He has expertise with large databases,
mining large databases.

Backup observing strategy & Galactic coverage	Ed

  Ed presented the following summary of areal coverage possible as a function
  of observing mode. The number of spiral arm tangencies is based on the model of
  Taylor and Cordes (1993). 
  This is in order of decreasing areal coverage and will represent our order of
  fall-back in case banding and/or photometric accuracy requires us to do so.
  (the path of pain ...)


  OBS.		LONG.		l		Gal			Correction
  MODE		RANGE		deg		Features
  ________________________________________________________________________________________		

  2 coverages     |10-66|        +/-56            outer bar             current strategy
  1/2 frame steps                                + 4 arm tangencies

  2 visits        |10-57.6|      +/-47.6          bar + 4 arm           banding
  2 epochs                                        tangencies
  full frame steps                                lose most of Coal Sac

  3 visits,1 epoch |10-51|       +/-41            bar + 3 arm           improve photometry
  1/3 frame steps                                 tangencies            but not banding

  3 passes        |20-55.3|      +/-35.3          no bar, all arm       correct banding &
  2 epochs                                        tangencies            improve photometry
  1/2 frame steps
  +1 full frame

  3 visits        |20-51.8|      +/-31.8          no bar, all arm       correct banding &
  3 epochs                                        tangencies            improve photometry

  This table uses the new SPOT v6.0 times.
  Which would we sacrifice first, the bar or the arms? 
  So far the simulations support the 2 coverage plan.  Would we get a 2 pt. dither with
  full frame offsets?..to get a subpixel dither.  In the current 1/2 frame offset
  strategy, we would be doing a dither in one direction.

New manuals are now available from the SSC.  A new SIRTF Observers Manual
and a new SPOT manual.  Can download them from the SIRTF web site.

Multiple pass simulations                       Remy & Brian

  Doing photometry on multiple passes shows a gain in the tenths of a % level in
  completeness and reliability.  Remy sent out plots for band 2.  For 2 passes
  we are at 2MASS completeness at 97-98% to 14th mag.
  For Channels 1 & 2, we do fine in C+R with 2 passes.  In the mag error plot,
  it's the difference between the flux we calculate and the flux from the
  truth image...it's a difference magnitude, not a mag error plot.

  Remy made some data available on an ftp site for the SSC for them to mosaic.
  Tony will put our data through the SSC mosaicer.
  Currently Remy is using IRAF drizzle to do the mosaicing, with drizzle=1.
  Remy may go out to the SSC after the AAS to use both the mosaicer and bandmerger.

  Will post-BCD pipeline software be released to the Legacy teams?  Tony says yes.
  For version 6.2, the release date is August.  All software should be released then.
  The SSC PSE is working and the "last bug" in the co-adder was fixed.  Susan
  said the 6.1 release of the mosaicer and PSE is the end of April and will be
  available to the Legacy teams. 

Progress on documents

  Science and Data Requirements Doc     John M.

     John was not in attendance so no report on this doc.

  Data Products Description             Marilyn

     We will have a version out for the team's comments by the May 7 telecon.

  Observing Concept Validation          Remy
 
     Has an outline.  Will fill in specifics of Bicay's questions for
     May review.  Where we don't have the details, we will summarize
     our philosophy.

  Quality Assurance                     Remy

     Will have an outline for May.  He will address QA points in his
     May review presentation but not in a document.  That will be
     worked on later.
     
  Pipeline Description                  Marilyn

     We have our detailed pipeline flowchart.  Will simplify the flowchart in the 
     power point presentation for the review and also hand out the detailed 
     flowchart.  We won't put together a document before the May review.

IR color classifications                Bob

  Martin Cohen has provided IRAC magnitudes for many kinds of objects.  We have a table
  of absolute magnitudes for about 80 kinds of objects.
  Chip has run Kurucz models.  J,H,K compare well.  IRAC bands not as well but he's
  working on it.  

  We will have an REU summer student.  He/she will obtain spectral classifications
  of many objects in the GLIMPSE verification observation field (W51). The 
  observational project will be 3 nights on WIYN in July.